Effective synthesis of cyclic peptide yunnanin C and analogues via Ser/Thr ligation (STL)-mediated peptide cyclization

Cyclic peptide yunnanin C isolated from the root of Stellaria yunnanensis was efficiently synthesized in which the linear peptide was prepared by Boc-SPPS and the cyclization was realized by serine/threonine ligation (STL)-mediated cyclization. In addition, nine yunnanin C analogues, including mutations of Tyr7Gly, Tyr7Val, Tyr7Pro, Tyr7Phe, Ser1Thr, Pro2Val, Gly5Pro, Phe6Ala and Ile4Ala, were prepared in the same fashion. Here, we demonstrated that STL-mediated peptide cyclization could be an effective approach to construct cyclic peptides. Except that proline at the C-terminus could retard the cyclization process, cyclization of yunnanin C analogues with various C-terminal amino acids proceeded with fast cyclization rate (<4 h) and only trace amount of dimers (<5%) at a working concentration of 5 mM.