The rest of the structure is an indole carbazole sub-unit. To view this interactive structure you need the Chime Plug-in which is available free. With this software you will be able to rotate and view the molecule in different ways with the mouse. One biological activity of Staurosporine is the inhibition of kinase proteins. A kinase is an enzyme that is critically involved in cell signalling, the process which determines how a biological cell reacts to it's environment within the body.
Cancer is typified by unregulated cell signalling leading to explosive cell growth.
Inhibition of these cell processes could have anti-cancer effects. Staurosporine exerts it's biological effect by interacting, or binding, with a biological target such as a kinase. The elucidation of the structure of Staurosporine bound to a protein kinase is shown below 9 . This image was obtained by crystallisation of the kinase with Staurosporine followed by x-ray diffraction . Staurosporine is shown as green, blue and red circles and the protein kinase is shown in yellow and purple.