Highly sensitive and rapid determination of tacrolimus in peripheral blood mononuclear cells by liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry

After solid organ transplantation, tacrolimus is given to prevent rejection. Therapeutic drug monitoring is used to reach target concentrations of tacrolimus in whole blood. Because the site of action of tacrolimus is the lymphocyte, and tacrolimus binds ~80% to erythrocytes, the intracellular tacrolimus concentration in lymphocytes is possibly more relevant. For this purpose, we aimed to develop, improve and validate a UPLC–MS/MS method to measure tacrolimus concentrations in isolated peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs). PBMCs were isolated using a Ficoll separation technique, followed by a washing step using red blood cell lysis. A cell suspension of 50 μL containing 1 million PBMCs was used in combination with MagSiMUS‐TDM^PREP. To each sample we added 30 μL lysis buffer, 20 μL reconstitution buffer containing ¹³C²H₄‐tacrolimus as internal standard, 40 μL MagSiMUS‐TDM^PREP Type I Particle Mix and 175 μL Organic Precipitation Reagent VI for methanol‐based protein precipitation. A 10 μL aliquot of the supernatant was injected into the UPLC–MS/MS system. The method was validated, resulting in high sensitivity and specificity. The method was linear (r² = 0.997) over the range 5.0–1250 pg/1 × 10⁶ PBMCs. The inaccuracy was <5% and the imprecision was <15%. The washing steps following Ficoll isolation could be performed at either room temperature or on ice, with no effect of the temperature on the results. A method for the analysis of tacrolimus concentrations in PBMCs was developed and successfully validated. Further research will be performed to investigate the correlation between concentrations in PBMCs and clinical outcome.     

New algorithms for maximum disjoint paths based on tree-likeness

Mathematical Programming - The aim of this paper is to show that every representative function of a maximally monotone operator is the Fitzpatrick transform of a bifunction corresponding to the...     

Synthesis of Highly Substituted γ‐Butyrolactones by a Gold‐Catalyzed Cascade Reaction of Benzyl Esters

Easily accessible benzylic esters of 3‐butynoic acids in a gold‐catalyzed cyclization/rearrangement cascade reaction provided 3‐propargyl γ‐butyrolactones with the alkene and the carbonyl group not being conjugated. Crossover experiments showed that the formation of the new C?C bond is an intermolecular process. Initially propargylic–benzylic esters were used, but alkyl‐substituted benzylic esters worked equally well. In the case of the propargylic–benzylic products, a simple treatment of the products with aluminum oxide initiated a twofold tautomerization to the allenyl‐substituted γ‐butyrolactones with conjugation of the carbonyl group, the olefin, and the allene. The synthetic sequence can be conducted stepwise or as a one‐pot cascade reaction with similar yields. Even in the presence of the gold catalyst the new allene remains intact.     

Soft hydrogen bonds to alkenes: the methanol–ethene prototype under experimental and theoretical scrutiny

An FTIR spectroscopic study of the elusive hydrogen-bonded methanol–ethene complex, the most elementary example for weak intermolecular alcohol hydrogen bonding to a π cloud, is presented. By isolating the complex in a supersonic jet, the rigorous comparability to high-level quantum chemical calculations is ensured. In stark contrast to classical hydrogen bonds, experimental overtone analysis reveals the harmonic oscillator approximation for the OH red shift to be accurate. Harmonic calculations up to explicitly correlated local coupled-cluster level are thus found to agree very well with experiment. The experimental OH values for the red shift (45 cm^–1), the small change in diagonal anharmonicity (–3 cm^–1) and the overtone intensity attenuation (2 × 10²-fold) together with theoretical predictions for the preferred structural arrangement and the zero-point-corrected dissociation energy (8 kJ mol^–1) may thus be regarded as definitive reference values for related systems and for more approximate computational methods. In particular, MP2 calculations are shown to fail for this kind of weak intermolecular interaction.     

Palladium‐Catalyzed Aminocarbonylation of Allylic Alcohols

A benign and efficient palladium‐catalyzed aminocarbonylation reaction of allylic alcohols is presented. The generality of this novel process is demonstrated by the synthesis of β,γ‐unsaturated amides including aliphatic, cinnamyl, and terpene derivatives. The choice of ligand is crucial for optimal carbonylation processes: Whereas in most cases the combination of PdCl₂ with Xantphos ( L6 ) gave best results, sterically hindered substrates performed better in the presence of simple triphenylphosphine ( L10 ), and primary anilines gave the best results using cataCXium® PCy ( L8 ). The reactivity of the respective catalyst system is significantly enhanced by addition of small amounts of water. Mechanistic studies and control experiments revealed a tandem allylic alcohol amination/C?N bond carbonylation reaction sequence.     

A Disulfide Intercalator Toolbox for the Site‐Directed Modification of Polypeptides

A disulfide intercalator toolbox was developed for site‐specific attachment of a broad variety of functional groups to proteins or peptides under mild, physiological conditions. The peptide hormone somatostatin (SST) served as model compound for intercalation into the available disulfide functionalization schemes starting from the intercalator or the reactive SST precursor before or after bioconjugation. A tetrazole–SST derivative was obtained that undergoes photoinduced cycloaddition in mammalian cells, which was monitored by live‐cell imaging.