Metabolite assignment of ultrafiltered synovial fluid extracted from knee joints of reactive arthritis patients using high resolution NMR spectroscopy

Currently, there are no reliable biomarkers available that can aid early differential diagnosis of reactive arthritis (ReA) from other inflammatory joint diseases. Metabolic profiling of synovial fluid (SF)—obtained from joints affected in ReA—holds great promise in this regard and will further aid monitoring treatment and improving our understanding about disease mechanism. As a first step in this direction, we report here the metabolite specific assignment of ¹H and ¹³C resonances detected in the NMR spectra of SF samples extracted from human patients with established ReA. The metabolite characterization has been carried out on both normal and ultrafiltered (deproteinized) SF samples of eight ReA patients (n = 8) using high-resolution (800 MHz) ¹H and ¹H─¹³C NMR spectroscopy methods such as one-dimensional ¹H CPMG and two-dimensional J-resolved¹H NMR and homonuclear ¹H─¹H TOCSY and heteronuclear¹H─¹³C HSQC correlation spectra. Compared with normal SF samples, several distinctive ¹H NMR signals were identified and assigned to metabolites in the ¹H NMR spectra of ultrafiltered SF samples. Overall, we assigned 53 metabolites in normal filtered SF and 64 metabolites in filtered pooled SF sample compared with nonfiltered SF samples for which only 48 metabolites (including lipid/membrane metabolites as well) have been identified. The established NMR characterization of SF metabolites will serve to guide future metabolomics studies aiming to identify/evaluate the SF-based metabolic biomarkers of diagnostic/prognostic potential or seeking biochemical insights into disease mechanisms in a clinical perspective.     

Reversal Diastereoselectivity Between the Organomagnesium and Organolithium Reagents on Chiral N-Tert-Butylsulfinylaldimines for the Preparation of Chiral Amines

The asymmetric synthesis of both the enantiomer of chiral amines from the single chiral source of N-tert-butylsulfinylaldimines (3) by simply changing the organometallic reagents through diastereoselective addition. An efficient enantioselective synthesis of chiral amines including (S)-3-methyl-1-(2-piperidin-1-yl-phenyl)butyl amine (6a), a key intermediate to prepare antidiabetic drug repaglinide (1), is reported.     

In vitro anti-cataract evaluation of standardised Abies pindrow leaf extract using isolated goat lenses

Oxidative stress is known to spark off the pathogenesis of cataract. Antioxidant potential of Abies pindrow Royle leaf extract (APE) is well established in the literature. In this context, standard aqueous leaf extract of this plant was evaluated for its role in hydrogen peroxide-induced cataract in isolated goat lenses using varying concentrations (5, 10, 15 and 20 mg/mL). Total phenol and flavonoidal content was evaluated and found to be high in concentration. Biochemical parameters, namely superoxide dismutase (SOD), glutathione (GSH), total protein content (TPC) and malondialdehyde (MDA), were evaluated. SOD, GSH and TPC formation was found to increase proportionally with increasing concentration. However, MDA level decreased significantly as the concentration of the extract increased. The results suggest that the extract under investigation can delay the onset and/or prevent the progression of cataract. Its anti-cataract potential may be attributed to the presence of high phenolics and flavonoids in APE. Photographic evaluation, further, confirmed the observation.     

Design and synthesis of fluorescent symmetric bis-triazolylated-1,4-dihydropyridines as potent antibreast cancer agents

Herein, we report the synthesis of fluorescent 1,4-dihydropyridine-linked bis-triazoles (2a–2n) through Hantzsch synthesis by the condensation of o/m-chloro-substituted benzaldehyde, ethyl 3-oxo-4(prop-2-yn-1-yloxy)butanoate, and ammonium acetate in the presence of Ba(NO₃)₂ as a catalyst followed by the click reaction of resultant Hantzsch product (1) with various aromatic as well as aliphatic azides. All the synthesized compounds were well characterized by ¹H-NMR, ¹³C-NMR, FTIR, and HRMS spectral techniques. Antibreast cancer evaluation of all the synthesized derivatives revealed that the compounds 2f (IC₅₀?=?7?±?0.02?µM) and 2g (IC₅₀?=?5?±?0.03?µM) showed better anticancer activity (lower IC₅₀) than the standard drug tamoxifen (IC₅₀?=?11.2?±?0.01?µM) against breast carcinoma (MDA-MB-231) cell line. The synthesized compounds were also screened against normal human embryonic kidney (HEK-293) cell line and found to be nontoxic. The fluorescent nature and cytotoxicity assay of these newly synthesized hybrids recommend their utility in tumor cell imaging.     

Development and validation of a sensitive LC-MS/MS method with electrospray ionization using multiple ions for quantitation of torcetrapib in hamster and dog plasma

A highly sensitive and specific LC-MS/MS method has been developed and validated for the estimation of torcetrapib (TTB) with 100 microL hamster/dog plasma using DRL-16126 as an internal standard (IS). The API-4000 Q Trap LC-MS/MS was operated under multiple-reaction monitoring mode using the electrospray ionization technique. The assay procedure involved extraction of TTB and IS from plasma with acetonitrile, which yielded consistent recoveries of 65.73 and 94.01% for TTB and 79.68 and 90.70% for IS in hamster and dog plasma, respectively. The total chromatographic run time was 3.0 min and the elution of TTB and IS occurred at approximately 2.25 and 2.20 min, respectively. The resolution of peaks was achieved with 0.01 m ammonium acetate:acetonitrile (15:85, v/v) at a flow rate of 0.40 mL/min on an Inertsil ODS-3 column. The method was proved to be accurate and precise at linearity range of 1.00-200 ng/mL with a correlation coefficient (r) of > or = 0.993. The method was rugged with 1.00 ng/mL as the lower limit of quantitation. TTB was stable in the battery of stability studies. The application of the assay to preclinical pharmacokinetic studies confirmed the utility of the assay to derive hamster/dog pharmacokinetic parameters.     

Ruthenium(II), rhodium(III) and iridium(III) based effective catalysts for hydrogenation under aerobic conditions

The new cationic mononuclear complexes [(η⁶-arene)Ru(Ph-BIAN)Cl]BF₄ [η⁶-arene = benzene (1), p-cymene (2)], [(η⁵-C₅H₅)Ru(Ph-BIAN)PPh₃]BF₄ (3) and [(η⁵-C₅Me₅)M(Ph-BIAN)Cl]BF₄ [M = Rh (4), Ir (5)] incorporating 1,2-bis(phenylimino)acenaphthene (Ph-BIAN) are reported. The complexes have been fully characterized by analytical and spectral (IR, NMR, FAB-MS, electronic and emission) studies. The molecular structure of the representative iridium complex [(η⁵-C₅Me₅)Ir(Ph-BIAN)Cl]BF₄ has been determined crystallographically. Complexes 1–5 effectively catalyze the reduction of terephthaldehyde in the presence of HCOOH/CH₃COONa in water under aerobic conditions and, among these complexes the rhodium complex [(η⁵-C₅Me₅)Rh(Ph-BIAN)Cl]BF₄ (4) displays the most effective catalytic activity.     

Preparation,Characterization and Coreflood Investigation of Polyacrylamide/Clay Nanocomposite Hydrogel System for Enhanced Oil Recovery

The synthesis and characterization of polyacrylamide/clay nanocomposites for the development of hydrogel system used in enhanced oil recovery is described. The synthesized nanocomposite copolymer was crosslinked with Chromium (III) acetate to form the hydrogel which exhibited an acceptable gel strength, gelation time and gel stability. The nanocomposite gels prepared with low crosslinker concentration (2000 ppm chromium acetate) showed higher gel strength and required longer gelation time than the conventional polyacrylamide (PAAm) gel; these are desirable properties for the effective placement of gel during enhanced oil recovery operations. The effects of various parameters, such as polymer and crosslinker concentration, on the gelation time and gel strength were evaluated using the bottle testing method. X-ray diffraction (XRD) and field-emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM) revealed the formation of intercalated and exfoliated clay morphologies. The effects of the clay content on the thermal stability and gel strength of the gel network were also investigated by thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) and rheological measurements (oscillatory time sweep profiles), respectively. Also, in-situ gelation and core flooding experiments revealed that a significant permeability reduction of the sand pack cores could be achieved at reservoir conditions when they were treated with the developed nanocomposite gel formulation. Hence, this nanocomposite gel system with low crosslinker concentration (10,000 ppm of nanocomposite polymer concentration containing 2000 ppm of clay with 2000 ppm chromium acetate crosslinker) may be suitable in water shut-off treatments required for enhanced oil recovery from the oil fields.     

Asymmetric synthesis of (–)-leiocarpin A via (–)-(S)-goniothalamin employing Julia–Kocienski olefination

A concise and enantioselective syntheses of antileukemic natural products such as (–)-(S)-goniothalamin and (–)-leiocarpin A has been accomplished in excellent yields. By employing reported conditions on suitable substrates via Julia–Kocienski olefination, intramolecular lactonization, and subsequently dehydroxylative olefination, (–)-(S)-goniothalamin was synthesized. Then Sharpless asymmetric dihydroxylation–intramolecular Michael addition on (–)-(S)-goniothalamin provided (–)-leiocarpin A.