Triterpenes and limonoids of Cedrela: Distribution,biosynthesis, and 1H and 13C NMR data

Cedrela genus, a member of the Meliaceae family, presents both chemical characteristics associated with and those that distinguish it from the rest of its members. The presence of triterpenes and limonoids is the characteristic of the Meliaceae family, but the class and type of these chemical constituents are distinctive for each genus. Cedrela includes cycloartane, ursane, oleanane, tirucallane, butyrospermane, and apotirucallane triterpenes, and its limonoids belongs to six class and nine types, known as class Ia-type havanensines, class Ib-type delevoyin, class II-type gedunin, class IIIb-type andirobin, class IIIg-type mexicanolide, class IVa-type evoludone, class Va-type obacunol, class V-type limonin, and class VIII. Each of these structural arrangements includes specific traits, defined by their biosynthetic origin, which can be established by means of structural elucidation techniques, particularly ¹H and ¹³C NMR, which assisted by 2D NMR techniques, allowing to deduce their structures unequivocally. The constant presence of these skeletal arrangements in Cedrela ensures that they are its chemophenetic markers and their recurrence is an important criterion for their identity. This review is a compilation of the occurrence of triterpenes and limonoids in Cedrela genus, detailing their biosynthetic association and collecting and organizing their NMR data, with the purpose of facilitating its location, analysis, and use in the phytochemical study of species from this genus.     

Polymeric Carbon Nitride-based Single Atom Photocatalysts for CO2 Reduction to C1 Products

Photocatalytic CO₂ reduction to C₁ fuels is considered to be an important way for alleviating increasingly serious energy crisis and environmental pollution. Due to the environment-friendly, simple preparation, easy formation of highly-stable metal-nitrogen(M-N_x) coordination bonds, and suitable band structure, polymeric carbon nitride-based single-atom catalysts(C₃N₄-based SACs) are expected to become a potential for CO₂ reduction under visible-light irradiation. In this review, we summarize the recent advancement on C₃N₄-based SACs for photocatalytic CO₂ reduction to C₁ products, including the reaction mechanism for photocatalytic CO₂ reduction to C₁ products, the structure and synthesis methods of C₃N₄-based SACs and their applications toward photocatalytic CO₂ reduction reaction(CO₂RR) for C₁ production. The current challenges and future opportunities of C₃N₄-based SACs for photoreduction of CO₂ are also discussed.     

Transition-Metal-Free Heterocyclic Carbon-Boron Bond Formation

Heteroaryl boronic acids and esters are extremely important and valuable intermediates because of their wide application in the synthesis of marketed drugs and bioactive compounds. Over the last couple of decades, the construction of highly important heteroaryl carbon-boron bonds has created huge attention. The transition-metal-free protocols are more green, less sensitive to air and moisture, and also economically advantageous over the transition-metal-based protocols. The transition-metal-free C−H borylation of heteroarenes and C−X (X=halogen) borylation of heteroaryl halides represents an excellent approach for their synthesis. Also, various cyclization and alkyne activation protocols have been recently established for their synthesis. The goal of this review article is to summarize the existing literature and the current state of the art for transition-metal-free synthesis of heteroaryl boronic acid and esters.     

Highly diastereoselective multicomponent synthesis of polysubstituted 2-hydroxy-2-trifluoromethylpiperidineswith four and five stereogenic centers

The Michael–Mannich cascade cyclization of cyano olefins, ethyl 4,4,4-trifluoro-3-oxobutanoate, aromatic aldehydes and ammonium acetate provides convenient stereoselective formation of ethyl 5,5-dicyano-4,6-diaryl-2-hydroxy-2-(trifluoromethyl)piperidine-3-carboxylates with fourstereogenic centers and dialkyl 4,6-diaryl-5-cyano-2-hydroxy-2-(trifluoromethyl)piperidine-3,5-dicarboxylates with five stereogenic centers. Ammonium acetate plays dual role, acting as a base and as a nitrogen source.     

A convenient synthesis of 3-aryl-5-methylidene-2-thiohydantoins

3-Aryl-5-methylidene-2-thiohydantoins were constructed in one-pot reaction of aryl isothiocyanates and 3-morpholino- alanine in alkaline medium with the subsequent treatment with boiling hydrochloric acid.     

Full cross-diffusion limit in the stationary Shigesada-Kawasaki-Teramoto model

This paper studies the asymptotic behavior of coexistence steady-states of the Shigesada-Kawasaki-Teramoto model as both cross-diffusion coefficients tend to infinity at the same rate. In the case when either one of two cross-diffusion coefficients tends to infinity, Lou and Ni [18] derived a couple of limiting systems, which characterize the asymptotic behavior of coexistence steady-states. Recently, a formal observation by Kan-on [10] implied the existence of a limiting system including the nonstationary problem as both cross-diffusion coefficients tend to infinity at the same rate. This paper gives a rigorous proof of his observation as far as the stationary problem. As a key ingredient of the proof, we establish a uniform $L^{\infty }$ estimate for all steady-states. Thanks to this a priori estimate, we show that the asymptotic profile of coexistence steady-states can be characterized by a solution of the limiting system.     

Optimisation of the ultrasound-assisted extraction of betalains and polyphenols from Amaranthus hypochondriacus var. Nutrisol

The present study optimised the ultrasound-assisted extraction (UAE) of bioactive compounds from Amaranthus hypochondriacus var. Nutrisol. Influence of temperature (25.86–54.14 °C) and ultrasonic power densities (UPD) (76.01–273.99 mW/mL) on total betalains (BT), betacyanins (BC), betaxanthins (BX), total polyphenols (TP), antioxidant activity (AA), colour parameters (L*, a*, and b*), amaranthine (A), and isoamaranthine (IA) were evaluated using response surface methodology. Moreover, betalain extraction kinetics and mass transfer coefficients (K_La) were determined for each experimental condition. BT, BC, BX, TP, AA, b*, K_La, and A were significantly affected (p < 0.05) by temperature extraction and UPD, whereas L*, a*, and IA were only affected (p < 0.05) by temperature. All response models were significantly validated with regression coefficients (R²) ranging from 87.46 to 99.29%. BT, A, IA, and K_La in UAE were 1.38, 1.65, 1.50, and 29.93 times higher than determined using conventional extraction, respectively. Optimal UAE conditions were obtained at 41.80 °C and 188.84 mW/mL using the desired function methodology. Under these conditions, the experimental values for BC, BX, BT, TP, AA, L*, a*, b*, K_La, A, and IA were closely related to the predicted values, indicating the suitability of the developed quadratic models. This study proposes a simple and efficient UAE method to obtain betalains and polyphenols with high antioxidant activity, which can be used in several applications within the food industry.     

Design,synthesis and evaluation of novel dehydroabietic acid-dithiocarbamate hybrids as potential multi-targeted compounds for tumor cytotoxicity

In the present study, novel representatives of the important group of biologically-active, dehydroabietic acid-bearing dithiocarbamate moiety, were synthesized and characterized by ¹H NMR, ¹³C NMR, HR-MS. The in vitro antiproliferative activity evaluation (MTT) indicated that these compounds exhibited potent inhibitory activities in various cancer cell lines (HepG-2, MCF-7, HeLa, T-24, MGC-803). Particularly, compound III-b possessed extraordinary cytotoxicity with low micromolar IC₅₀ values ranging from 4.07 to 38.84 µM against tested cancer cell lines, while displayed weak cytotoxicity on two normal cell lines (LO-2 and HEK 293 T). Subsequently, the potential mechanisms of representative compound III-b were elementarily investigated by Transwell experiment, which showed III-b can inhibit cancer cells migration. Annexin-V/PI dual staining showed that the compound can induce HepG-2 cells apoptosis in a dose-dependent manner. Meanwhile this apoptosis may be related to the upregulated protein expression of cleaved-caspase 3, cleaved-caspase 9, Bax and downregulated of Bcl-2 indicated by Western Blot. Later study further confirmed that ROS levels in HepG-2 cells increased significantly with the rise of concentrations. In addition, through the network pharmacology data analyzing, the core targets and signaling pathways of compound III-b for treatment of liver neoplasms were forecasted. Molecular docking model showed that compound III-b had high affinity with hub targets (CASP3, EGFR, HSP90AA1, MAPK1, ERBB2, MDM2), suggesting that compound III-b might target the hub protein to modulate signaling activity. Taken together, these data indicated that dehydroabietic acid structural modification following the “Molecular hybridization” principle is a feasible way to discover the potential multi-targeted antitumor compounds.