Site‐Selective Labeling of a Lysine Residue in Human Serum Albumin

Conjugation to human serum albumin (HSA) has emerged as a powerful approach for extending the in vivo half‐life of many small molecule and peptide/protein drugs. Current HSA conjugation strategies, however, can often yield heterogeneous mixtures with inadequate pharmacokinetics, low efficacies, and variable safety profiles. Here, we designed and synthesized analogues of TAK‐242, a small molecule inhibitor of Toll‐like receptor 4, that primarily reacted with a single lysine residue of HSA. These TAK‐242‐based cyclohexene compounds demonstrated robust reactivity, and Lys64 was identified as the primary conjugation site. A bivalent HSA conjugate was also prepared in a site‐specific manner. Additionally, HSA‐cyclohexene conjugates maintained higher levels of stability both in human plasma and in mice than the corresponding maleimide conjugates. This new conjugation strategy promises to broadly enhance the performance of HSA conjugates for numerous applications.     

Direct organocatalytic asymmetric Mannich-type reactions in aqueous media: one-pot Mannich-allylation reactions

The first direct organocatalytic asymmetric Mannich-type reactions in aqueous media are demonstrated herein. l-Proline-catalyzed reactions in aqueous media to provide β-formyl substituted α-amino acid derivatives with excellent diastereoselectivities (dr up to 19:1, syn/anti) and high enantioselectivities (ee between 72 and >99%). These conditions provided for the development of novel one-pot asymmetric syntheses of cyclic γ-allyl substituted α-amino acid derivatives (ee up to >99%). This was accomplished by combining the proline-catalyzed Mannich-type reactions with indium promoted allylations in aqueous media.     

CE-ESI-MS metabolic fingerprinting of Leishmania resistance to antimony treatment

Metabolomics has become an invaluable tool to unveil biology of pathogens, with immediate application to chemotherapy. It is currently accepted that there is not one single technique capable of obtaining the whole metabolic fingerprint of a biological system either due to their different physical-chemical properties or concentrations. In this work, we have explored the capability of capillary electrophoresis mass spectrometry with a sheathless interface with electrospray ionization (CE-ESI-TOF-MS) to separate metabolites in order to be used as a complementary technique to LC. As proof of concept, we have compared the metabolome of Leishmania infantum promastigotes BCN 150 (Sb (III) IC(50) = 20.9 μM) and its variation when treated with 120 μM of Sb(III) potassium tartrate for 12 h, as well as with its Sb(III) resistant counterpart obtained by growth of the parasites under increasing Sb(III) in a step-wise manner up to 180 μM. The number of metabolites compared were of 264 for BCN150 Sb(III) treated versus nontreated and of 195 for Sb(III) resistant versus susceptible parasites. After successive data filtering, differences in seven metabolites identified in databases for Leishmania pathways, showed the highest significant differences, corresponding mainly to amino acids or their metabolite surrogates. Most of them were assigned to sulfur containing amino acids and polyamine biosynthetic pathways, of special relevance considering the deterioration of the thiol-dependent redox metabolism in Leishmania by Sb(III). Given the low concentrations typical for most of these metabolites, the assay can be considered a success that should be explored for new biological questions.     

Organocatalysis as a safe practical method for the stereospecific dibromination of unsaturated compounds

Organocatalytic stereospecific dibromination of a wide variety of functionalized alkenes was achieved using a stable, inexpensive halogen source, 1,3-dibromo 5,5-dimethylhydantoin, and a simple thiourea catalyst at room temperature. The presence of a tertiary amine enhanced the rate of the dibromination reaction, and yields were good in various solvents, including aqueous solvents. The procedure was extended to alkynes and aromatic rings and to dichlorination reactions by using the 1,3-dichloro hydantoin derivative.     

Analytical study proving alprazolam degradation to its main impurity triazolaminoquinoleine through Maillard reaction

Triazolaminoquinoleine is rapidly formed in formulations of alprazolam tablets in presence of excipients, and its generation is speeded up with increasing temperature and humidity. The present paper deals with detailed quantitative and qualitative studies into the nonactive constituents of the formulation in order to determine the excipient (or the mixture) responsible for the degradation. Our studies have demonstrated that reducing carbohydrate excipients play a fundamental role in the generation of triazolaminoquinoleine, with lactose as the main one responsible, through a Maillard reaction. In order to demonstrate the validity of the proposed degradation mechanism, p-nitrobenzaldehyde has been employed as a model of reaction of the nucleophylic attack of amino-opened structure of alprazolam to an aldehyde to generate the first intermediate involved in Maillard reaction, a Schiff base. This model enables the identification of all the intermediates by mass spectrometry and/or nuclear magnetic resonance techniques, with the outcome of this experiment leading to a full understanding of the generation pathway. Calcium carbonate has been proposed as a possible tablet diluent replacing lactose in the pharmaceutical formulation. Figure Apparence of the samples after degradation treatment. Synthetic mixtures leaving one excipient out of the pharmaceutical formulation. Excipient missing for sample 3 is Lactose.     

High-performance liquid chromatographic analysis of dextromethorphan, guaifenesin and benzoate in a cough syrup for stability testing

A method has been developed for the analysis of a cough syrup containing dextromethorphan, guaifenesin, benzoic acid, saccharin and other components. Forced degradation was also studied to demonstrate that the method could be employed during a stability study of the syrup. Final conditions were phosphate buffer (25 mM, pH 2.8) with triethylamine (TEA)-acetonitrile (75:25, v/v). In such conditions, all the actives, excipients and degradation products were baseline resolved in less than 14 min, and different wavelengths were used for the different analytes and related compounds.     

Organocatalytic enantioselective synthesis of metabotropic glutamate receptor ligands

(R)-Proline catalyzes the amination reaction of functionalized indane carboxaldehydes and allows for the efficient enantioselective synthesis (>99% ee) of the metabotropic glutamate receptor ligands (S)-AIDA and (S)-APICA. [reaction: see text]