Biomimetic alcohol oxidations by an iron(III) porphyrin complex: relevance to cytochrome P-450 catalytic oxidation and involvement of the two-state radical rebound mechanism

The systematic oxidation reactions of a wide range of alcohols have been carried out by using an iron porphyrin complex in order to understand their relation to cytochrome P-450 enzymes and to have a practical application to organic synthesis. The iron porphyrin complex catalyzed efficiently alcohol oxidation to the respective carbonyl compound via a high-valent iron-oxo porphyrin intermediate ((Porp)Fe=O+). Several mechanistic studies such as isotope 18O labeling, deuterium isotope effect, linear free energy relationship, and ring-opening of radical clock substrate, have suggested that the alcohol is oxidized by a sequence of reactions involving an alpha-hydroxyalkyl radical intermediate and oxygen rebound to form the gem-diol, dehydration of which yields the carbonyl compounds. Moreover, it has been proposed that a two-state reactivity mechanism can also be adopted for alcohol oxidation reactions in iron porphyrin model systems as exhibited by P-450 enzymes.     

Computational study of conformational preferences of thioamide-containing azaglycine peptides

The effect of thioamide substitution on the conformational stability of an azaglycine-containing peptide, For-AzaGly-NH2 (1), was investigated for the sake of finding possible applications by using ab initio and DFT methods. As model compounds, For-[psiCSNH]-AzaGly-NH2 (2), For-AzaGly-[psiCSNH]-NH2 (3), and For-[psiCSNH]-AzaGly-[psiCSNH]-NH2 (4) were used. Two-dimensional phi-psi potential energy surfaces (PESs) for 2-4 were calculated at the B3LYP/6-31G*//HF/6-31G* level in gas (epsilon = 1.0) and in water (epsilon = 78.4) by applying the isodensity polarizable continuum model (IPCM) method. On the basis of these PESs, the minimum energy conformations for 2-4 were characterized at the B3LYP level with 6-31G*, 6-311G**, and 6-31+G** basis sets. The remarkable structural effect of thioamide substitution for 2-4 is that beta-strand structure is observed as a global or local minimum. The minima of 2-4 are also compared with those for glycine and thioamide-containing glycine peptides. Our theoretical results demonstrate that compounds 2-4 would be used to design controllable secondary structures.     

Magnetic couplings in vanadium aromatic sandwich complexes and their crystals by using DFT methods

Using density functional theory, we have theoretically studied the origin of ferromagnetic coupling of spins in the long multiple deckers of vanadium sandwich complexes with benzene (Bz). This is done by calculating the band structure of their infinite one-dimensional (1D) crystals along the periodic (=Z) direction. We find that the magnetic coupling can be ascribed to spin polarization in the band (= those derived from d(z2)) whose k states are not involved in the formation of partial covalent bonds between vanadium atoms and benzene rings. We have also studied magnetic and electronic properties of multiple deckers of a naphthalene (Np)-vanadium complex. We find that there is a stronger covalent interaction as well as a stronger electrostatic interaction between V and Np rings than between V and Bz rings. This suggests that there is a possibility of longer multiple deckers of a Np-V complex. In addition, ferrimagnetic coupling of spins is expected, resulting in a magnetic moment 45% larger than that of the Bz-V complex at the same length. For their 1D crystals, band structure analysis also shows that the origin of magnetic coupling in long multiple deckers should be similar to that of Bz-V multiple deckers.     

H-NMR studies of duplex DNA decamer containing a uracil cyclobutane dimer: implications regarding the high UV mutagenecity of CC photolesions

To determine the origin of the UV-specific CC to TT tandem mutation at the CC site, we made a duplex DNA decamer containing a uracil cis-syn cyclobutane dimer (CBD) as the deaminated model of a cytosine dimer. Two-dimensional 1H-NMR spectroscopy studies were performed on this sequence where two adenines (Ade) were opposite to the uracil dimer. Two imino protons of the uracil dimer were found to retain Watson-Crick hydrogen bonding with the opposite Ade, although the 5'-U(NH) of the dimer site showed unusual upfield shift like that of the 5'-T(NH) of the TT dimer, which seemed to be associated with deshielding by the flanking base rather than with reduced hydrogen bonding. (McAteer et al. 1998, J. Mol. Biol. 282:1013-1032). Hydrogen bondings at the dimer site were also supported by detecting typical strong nuclear Overhauser effects (NOE) between two imino protons and the opposite Ade H2 or NH2. But sequential NOE interactions of base protons with sugar protons were absent at the two flanking nucleotides of the 5' side of the uracil dimer and at the intradimer site, contrasting with its thymine analog where sequential NOE was absent only at the A4-T5 step. In addition, NOE cross peak for U5(NH) <--> A4(H2) was detected, although the NOE interactions of U6(NH) with A7(H2) and A17(H2) were not observed in contrast to the thymine dimer duplex. This different local structural alteration may be affected by the induced right-hand twisted puckering mode of cis-syn cyclobutane ring of the uracil dimer in the B-DNA duplex, even though the isolated uracil dimer had left-hand twisted puckering rigidly. In parallel, these observations may be correlated with observed differences in mutagenic properties between cis-syn UU dimer and cis-syn TT dimer.     

Construction of a 2,6-difunctionalized 2-methyl-2H-1-benzopyran library by using a solid-phase synthesis protocol

[reaction: see text] A library containing 1200 analogues of 2,6-difunctionalized 2-methyl-2H-1-benzopyran was constructed by using a solid-phase synthesis protocol. Polymer-bound 6-amido-, 6-sulfonamido-, and 6-uredo-functionalized 2-hydroxymethyl-2-methylbenzopyrans 10 were prepared as part of a first-generation diversification step by employing reactions of respective acid halides, sulfonyl chlorides, and isocyanates with the amine precursor 7. Transformations of the resin-bound intermediates 10 by reactions with alkyl and acid halides were then used to produce a diverse series of 2,6-difunctionalized 2-methyl-2H-1-benzopyran analogues 12 and 14.     

The 2-(4-trifluoromethylphenylsulfonyl)ethoxycarbonyl (Tsc) amino-protecting group: use in the solid-phase synthesis of pyrrole-imidazole polyamides

The development of the 2-(4-trifluoromethylphenylsulfonyl)ethoxycarbonyl (Tsc) function, a novel base-sensitive amino-protecting group, and its application to the preparation of DNA-binding polyamides are described. Pyrrole-imidazole polyamides were synthesized by an efficient solid-phase method under conditions compatible with Fmoc chemistry using two Tsc-protected amino acids, Tsc-Py-OH 1a and Tsc-Im-OH 1b.     

Infrared-visible and visible-visible double resonance spectroscopy of 1-hydroxy-9,10-anthraquinone-(H2O)n (n=1,2) complexes

The structures of hydrated 1-hydroxyanthraquinone complexes (1-HAQ), 1-HAQ(H2O)n=1,2, with intramolecular and intermolecular hydrogen bonding interactions were studied using laser spectroscopic methods such as laser induced fluorescence, fluorescence-detected infrared, infrared-visible hole burning, and visible-visible hole burning spectroscopy. In the 1:1 complex 1-HAQ(H2O)1, the water binds to the free carbonyl group of 1-HAQ not associated with intramolecular hydrogen bond. The second water in the 1:2 complex, 1-HAQ(H2O)2, binds to the first water of the 1:1 complex rather than other hydrogen bonding sites of 1-HAQ. A pair of two geometric isomers was produced in a supersonic jet for each of the 1:1 and 1:2 complexes. Both isomers of each complex have the same vibrational spectra in the region of the OH stretching vibration of water, but have different energies for the 0-0 band of vibronic transition due to the asymmetry of the two phenyl rings in 1-HAQ. The 0-0 bands for all four species of 1-HAQ(H2O)n=1,2 were unambiguously assigned by comparing with the results of ab initio calculations, which yielded the structures, vibrational frequencies, and relative energies of the frontier molecular orbitals.