Application of serine- and threonine-derived cyclic sulfamidates for the preparation of S-linked glycosyl amino acids in solution- and solid-phase peptide synthesis

Cyclic sulfamidates were synthesized in 60% yield from L-serine and allo-L-threonine, respectively. These sulfamidates reacted with a variety of unprotected 1-thio sugars in aqueous bicarbonate buffer (pH 8) to afford the corresponding S-linked serine- and threonine-glycosyl amino acids with good diastereoselectivity (> or =97%) after hydrolysis of the N-sulfates. The serine-derived sulfamidate was incorporated into a simple dipeptide to generate a reactive dipeptide substrate that underwent chemoselective ligation with a 1-thio sugar to afford an S-linked glycopeptide. This sulfamidate was also incorporated into a peptide on a solid support in conjunction with solid-phase peptide synthesis. Chemoselective ligation of a 1-thio sugar with the cyclic sulfamidate was achieved on the solid support, followed by removal of the N-sulfate. Finally, the peptide chain of the resulting support-bound S-linked glycopeptide was extended using standard peptide synthesis procedures.     

Synthesis of azabicyclo[2.2.n]alkane systems as analogues of 3-[1-methyl-2-(S)-pyrrolidinyl- methoxy]pyridine (A-84543)

This work is connected with the epibatidine field and describes the synthesis of several analogues of compounds that present affinity for nicotinic acetylcholine receptors, such as 3-[1-methyl-2-(S)-pyrrolidinylmethoxy]pyridine (A-84543). These analogues bear a 3-pyridyl ether substituent at the bridgehead carbon of the azabicyclo[2.2.n]alkane system. Particularly, in the case of the 1-substituted 2-azabicyclo[2.2.2]octane system, a new synthetic route has been developed, which involves the synthesis of a novel rigid sulfamidate that allows the straightforward introduction of nucleophiles.     

Practical synthesis of functionalized terminal alkynes, 3,3,3-triethoxypropyne and ketal protected prop-2-ynones

Practical and economical synthesis of synthetically valuable 3,3,3-triethoxypropyne, ketal protected phenyl and methyl substituents prop-2-ynones is described. Bromination and subsequent 18-crown-6 catalyzed elimination of triethylorthoacrylate and ketal protected terminal alkenes with methyl and phenyl substituent which are inturn readily available from triethylorthopropionate, 3-chlorobutan-2-one and propiophenone afforded multigram quantities (>10?g) of corresponding functionalized terminal alkynes. Exploration of the synthetic utility of these alkynes is also demonstrated by the acetylenic substitution of the phenylalaninol derived 1,2-cyclic sulfamidate to deliver chiral alkynylated amines.     

Asymmetric syntheses of (R)-4-halo-6,6a,7,8,9,10-hexahydro-5H-pyrazino[1,2-a][1,n]naphthyridines,important 5-HT2C agonist precursors

Asymmetric syntheses of N-protected (R)-4-halo-6,6a,7,8,9,10-hexahydro-5H-pyrazino[1,2-a][1,n]naphthyridines, advanced intermediates for the synthesis of highly potent and selective 5-HT_2C agonists, are described. The key transformation involves ring opening of N-protected bicyclic sulfamidate (R)-hexahydro-3H-pyrazino[1,2-c][1,2,3]oxathiazine 1,1-dioxide with (4-halo-2-fluoropyridin-3-yl)lithiums or (3-bromo-5-fluoropyridin-4-yl)lithium. In situ hydrolyses of the resultant sulfamic acids and subsequent intramolecular nucleophilic aromatic substitutions (S_NAr) produce the enantiopure tricycles. The two step procedure represents new methodology for the stereoselective syntheses of tetrahydronaphthyridines.     

Cyclic sulfamidates as lactam precursors. An efficient asymmetric synthesis of (-)-aphanorphine

A short and efficient enantioselective synthesis of (-)-aphanorphine is described based on the use of a cyclic sulfamidate to provide a suitably functionalised lactam that allows for construction of the tricyclic 3-benzazepine scaffold.     

An efficient preparation of isosteric phosphonate analogues of sphingolipids by opening of oxirane and cyclic sulfamidate intermediates with alpha-lithiated alkylphosphonic esters

D-erythro-(2S,3R,4E)-Sphingosine-1-phosphonate (1), the isosteric phosphonate analogue of naturally occurring sphingosine 1-phosphate (1a), and D-ribo-phytosphingosine 1-phosphonate (2), the isosteric phosphonate analogue of D-ribo-phytosphingosine-1-phosphate (2a), were synthesized starting with methyl 2,3-O-isopropylidene-d-glycerate (4) and D-ribo-phytosphingosine (3), respectively. Oxirane 12 was formed in eight steps from 4, and cyclic sulfamidate 22 was formed in five steps from 3. The phosphonate group was introduced via regioselective ring-opening reactions of oxirane 12 and cyclic sulfamidate 22 with lithium dialkyl methylphosphonate, affording 13 and 23, respectively. The synthesis of 1 was completed by S(N)2 displacement of chloromesylate intermediate 14b with azide ion, followed by conversion of the resulting azido group to a NHBoc group and deprotection. The synthesis of 2 was completed by cleavage of the acetal, N-benzyl, and alkyl phosphonate ester groups.     

Gold(I)-catalysed synthesis of cyclic sulfamidates by intramolecular allene hydroamination

Six-membered cyclic sulfamidates are prepared in high yields by treatment of allenic sulfamates with readily available gold(I) complexes. The reaction enables formation of N-substituted quaternary centres and complements existing processes for sulfamidate formation.     

Deconstructing green fluorescent protein

Green fluorescent protein (GFP) has been reassembled from two pieces, a large fragment 214 amino acids in length that is produced recombinantly (GFP 1-10) and a short synthetic peptide corresponding to the 11th stave of the beta-barrel that is 16 amino acids long (synthetic GFP 11), following a system developed by Waldo and co-workers (Cabantous, S.; et al. Nat. Biotechnol. 2005, 23, 102-7) as an in vivo probe for protein association and folding. We demonstrate that the reassembled protein has identical absorption and excited-state proton transfer dynamics as a whole protein of the identical sequence. We show that the reassembled protein can be taken apart and the peptide replaced with a different synthetic peptide designed to perturb the chromophore absorption. Thus, this semisynthetic reassembly process offers a general route for studying the assembly of the beta-barrel as well as the introduction of unnatural amino acids.     

Synthesis and Conformational Analysis of Hybrid α/β‐Dipeptides Incorporating S‐Glycosyl‐β2,2‐Amino Acids

We synthesized and carried out the conformational analysis of several hybrid dipeptides consisting of an α‐amino acid attached to a quaternary glyco‐β‐amino acid. In particular, we combined a S‐glycosylated β^2,2‐amino acid and two different types of α‐amino acid, namely, aliphatic (alanine) and aromatic (phenylalanine and tryptophan) in the sequence of hybrid α/β‐dipeptides. The key step in the synthesis involved the ring‐opening reaction of a chiral cyclic sulfamidate, inserted in the peptidic sequence, with a sulfur‐containing nucleophile by using 1‐thio‐β‐D ‐glucopyranose derivatives. This reaction of glycosylation occurred with inversion of configuration at the quaternary center. The conformational behavior in aqueous solution of the peptide backbone and the glycosidic linkage for all synthesized hybrid glycopeptides was analyzed by using a protocol that combined NMR experiments and molecular dynamics with time‐averaged restraints (MD‐tar). Interestingly, the presence of the sulfur heteroatom at the quaternary center of the β‐amino acid induced θ torsional angles close to 180° (anti). Notably, this value changed to 60° (gauche) when the peptidic sequence displayed aromatic α‐amino acids due to the presence of CH–π interactions between the phenyl or indole ring and the methyl groups of the β‐amino acid unit.     

A Novel Multistep Mechanism for the Stereocontrolled Ring Opening of Hindered Sulfamidates: Mild,Green, and Efficient Reactivity with Alcohols

Cyclic hindered sulfamidates exhibited an outstanding performance in their ring‐opening reactions with alcohols and in the absence of any external activator. The mechanism of this unprecedented transformation was thoroughly studied both experimentally and theoretically. As a result, a nontrivial stepwise pathway involving solvent‐induced conversion of the sulfamidates to activated aziridinium and then to oxazolinium cations, which are finally opened at their 5‐position with inversion of configuration, is proposed. The presence of the SO₃ moiety in the sulfamidate was revealed as a “built‐in activator”. In fact, the spontaneous SO₃ cleavage takes place under the reaction conditions and avoids the subsequent step of hydrolysis after the ring opening of the sulfamidates. This is another important improvement of this methodology with respect to the standard basic conditions, allowing a greater compatibility with other functional groups. Furthermore, the carbamate group plays a key role in this mechanism. Briefly, a highly chemoselective and stereoespecific formal solvolysis of hindered sulfamidates with alcohols without further activation is described. This reaction takes place exclusively at the quaternary center with inversion of configuration, providing a new straightforward synthetic route to O‐substituted α‐methylisoserines.     

Enzymatic Enantioselective Decarboxylative Protonation of Heteroaryl Malonates

The enzyme aryl/alkenyl malonate decarboxylase (AMDase) catalyses the enantioselective decarboxylative protonation (EDP) of a range of disubstituted malonic acids to give homochiral carboxylic acids that are valuable synthetic intermediates. AMDase exhibits a number of advantages over the non‐enzymatic EDP methods developed to date including higher enantioselectivity and more environmentally benign reaction conditions. In this report, AMDase and engineered variants have been used to produce a range of enantioenriched heteroaromatic α‐hydroxycarboxylic acids, including pharmaceutical precursors, from readily accessible α‐hydroxymalonates. The enzymatic method described here represents an improvement upon existing synthetic chemistry methods that have been used to produce similar compounds. The relationship between the structural features of these new substrates and the kinetics associated with their enzymatic decarboxylation is explored, which offers further insight into the mechanism of AMDase.     

Synthesis of antifungal glucan synthase inhibitors from enfumafungin

An efficient, new, and scalable semisynthesis of glucan synthase inhibitors 1 and 2 from the fermentation product enfumafungin 3 is described. The highlights of the synthesis include a high-yielding ether bond-forming reaction between a bulky sulfamidate 17 and alcohol 4 and a remarkably chemoselective, improved palladium(II)-mediated Corey-Yu allylic oxidation at the highly congested C-12 position of the enfumafungin core. Multi-hundred gram quantities of the target drug candidates 1 and 2 were prepared, in 12 linear steps with 25% isolated yield and 13 linear steps with 22% isolated yield, respectively.     

Efficient and versatile stereoselective synthesis of cryptophycins

The cryptophycins are a family of cyclic depsipeptides with four retrosynthetic units A to D which correspond to the respective amino acids and hydroxy acids. A new synthetic route to unit A allows the selective generation of all four stereogenic centres by introducing two of them in a catalytic asymmetric dihydroxylation, followed by substrate-controlled diastereoselective reactions. The diol also serves as the epoxide precursor. This approach provides selective access to stereoisomers of unit A (enantiomers, epimers) for structure-activity relationship studies. The unit A derivatives were incorporated into cryptophycin-1, cryptophycin-52 and a novel epimer of cryptophycin-52.     

Dynamic kinetic resolution in the stereoselective synthesis of 4,5-diaryl cyclic sulfamidates by using chiral rhodium-catalyzed asymmetric transfer hydrogenation

The dynamic kinetic resolution of 4,5-diaryl cyclic sulfamidate imines was achieved via asymmetric transfer hydrogenation using a HCO(2)H/Et(3)N mixture as the hydrogen source and chiral Rh catalysts (R,R)- or (S,S)-RhCl(TsDPEN)Cp* affording the corresponding cyclic sulfamidates in good yields with up to >20 : 1 dr and up to >99% ee.     

Enhancing the scope of the Diels-Alder reaction through isonitrile chemistry: emergence of a new class of acyl-activated dienophiles

α,β-Unsaturated imides, formylated at the nitrogen atom, comprise a new and valuable family of dienophiles for servicing Diels-Alder reactions. These systems are assembled through extension of recently discovered isonitrile chemistry to the domain of α,β-unsaturated acids. Cycloadditions are facilitated by Et(2)AlCl, presumably via chelation between the two carbonyl groups of the N-formyl amide. Applications of the isonitrile/Diels-Alder logic to the IMDA reaction, as well as methodologies to modify the N-formyl amide of the resultant cycloaddition product, are described. It is expected that this easily executed chemistry will provide a significant enhancement for application of Diels-Alder reactions to many synthetic targets.     

Synthesis of C-5 Analogs of N-Acetylneuraminic Acid via Indium-Mediated Allylation of N-Substituted 2-Amino-2-deoxymannoses

This paper presents a short synthesis of new analogs of N-acetylneuraminic acid (Neu5Ac) varied structurally at C-5. The synthetic strategy includes indium-mediated coupling reactions between ethyl 2-(bromomethyl)acrylate and N-derivatized mannosamines, and the ozonolysis of the resulting enoates. The main advantage of this indium-mediated allylation for the synthesis of neuraminic acids comes from the efficient, stereoselective C-C bond formation, which affords predominantly the correct diastereomer having a threo relationship between the newly generated hydroxyl group and the C-2 amide group of mannosamine. By this approach, Neu5Boc (4a), Neu5Gly (4b), Neu5(6-NHCbz)hexanoyl (4c), and Neu5(1-naphthyl)acetyl (4d) were prepared in three steps (overall approximately 50%). In addition, several N-substituted neuraminic acids were synthesized by N-acylation of the amino functionality of neuraminic acid (5b), which was obtained by deprotecting the N-Boc group of Neu5Boc (4a). These analogs include Neu5BrAc (6a), Neu5acryloyl (6b), Neu5benzoyl (6c) and Neu5benzoyl-4-benzoyl (6d). The N-acylation method is especially suited for synthesis of neuraminic acids bearing substituents that can not tolerate ozonolysis or that are unstable (photo)chemically. Finally, we illustrate the utility of synthetic neuraminic acids by converting 4c to a derivative of 2-deoxy-2,3-didehydroneuraminic acid (8c), a precursor to inhibitors of neuraminidases.     

Design, synthesis, and evaluation of a new generation of modular nucleophilic glycine equivalents for the efficient synthesis of sterically constrained alpha-amino acids

A new generation of modular achiral glycine equivalents have been evaluated with respect to their synthetic utility for the production of tailor-made, sterically constrained alpha-amino acids, which proved to be the most efficient approach developed to date for the synthesis of symmetrical alpha,alpha-disubstituted-alpha-amino acids. Among the new series of achiral glycine equivalents, one was found to be a superior glycine derivative for the Michael additions with various (R)- or (S)-N-(E-enoyl)-4-phenyl-1,3-oxazolidin-2-ones representing a general and practical synthesis of sterically constrained beta-substituted pyroglutamic acids. In particular, the application of these complexes allowed for the preparation of several beta-substituted pyroglutamic acids which include electron-releasing and sterically demanding substituents in the structure thus increasing the synthetic efficiency and expanding the generality of these Michael addition reactions.     

Asymmetric Alkylation of Cyclic Ketones with Dehydroalanine via H-Bond-Directing Enamine Catalysis: Straightforward Access to Enantiopure Unnatural α-Amino Acids

The growing importance of structurally diverse and functionalized enantiomerically pure unnatural amino acids in the design of drugs, including peptides, has stimulated the development of new synthetic methods. This study reports the challenging direct asymmetric alkylation of cyclic ketones with dehydroalanine derivatives via a conjugate addition reaction for the synthesis of enantiopure ketone-based α-unnatural amino acids. The key to success was the design of a bifunctional primary amine-thiourea catalyst that combines H-bond-directing activation and enamine catalysis. The simultaneous dual activation of the two relatively unreactive partners, confirmed by mass spectrometry studies, results in high reactivity while securing high levels of stereocontrol. A broad substrate scope is accompanied by versatile downstream chemical modifications. The mild reaction conditions and consistently excellent enantioselectivities (>95 % ee in most cases) render this protocol highly practical for the rapid construction of valuable noncanonical enantiopure α-amino-acid building blocks.     

Co-operative effect of Lewis acids with transition metals for organic synthesis

Transition metal-mediated or -catalyzed carbon-carbon bond or carbon-heteroatom bond forming reactions are among the most powerful tools in organic synthesis. In addition, Lewis acid-mediated or -catalyzed organic transformations are widely used. In this context, an effective combination of these two powerful protocols or an efficient cooperation of transition metals with Lewis acids should open a new era in synthetic chemistry. This tutorial review summarizes representative synthetic methodologies developed in the past decades employing this co-operative effect.     

Defining intrinsic hydrophobicity of amino acids' side chains in random coil conformation. Reversed-phase liquid chromatography of designed synthetic peptides vs. random peptide data sets

The two leading RP-HPLC approaches for deriving hydrophobicity values of amino acids utilize either sets of designed synthetic peptides or extended random datasets often extracted from proteomics experiments. We find that the best examples of these two methods provide virtually identical results--with exception of Lys, Arg, and His. The intrinsic hydrophobicity values of the remaining residues as determined by Kovacs et al. (Biopolymers 84 (2006) 283) correlates with an R(2)-value of 0.995+ against amino acid retention coefficients from our Sequence Specific Retention Calculator model (Anal. Chem. 78 (2006) 7785). This novel finding lays the foundation for establishing consensus amino acids hydrophobicity scales as determined by RP-HPLC. Simultaneously, we find the assignment of hydrophobicity values for charged residues (Lys, Arg and His at pH 2) is ambiguous; their retention contribution is strongly affected by the overall peptide hydrophobicity. The unique behavior of the basic residues is related to the dualistic character of the RP peptide retention mechanism, where both hydrophobic and ion-pairing interactions are involved. We envision the introduction of "sliding" hydrophobicity scales for charged residues as a new element in peptide retention prediction models. We also show that when using a simple additive retention prediction model, the "correct" coefficient value optimization (0.98+ correlation against values determined by synthetic peptide approach) requires a training set of at least 100 randomly selected peptides.