Facile Total Synthesis of Three Natural 1,7-Diaryl-4-hepten-3-ones

Linear 1,7-diarylheptanoids (Ar¹-C₇-Ar²) are a large group of interesting natural products isolated from plants belonging to Alinia,Curcuma, Zingiber, Alnua,Centridobium and Acer genera used as traditional medicines in some oriental countries¹. Pharmacological experiments exhibited that some of them had many physiological actions such as anti-inflammatory, antifungicial, antioxidative,antihepatotoxic activities and so on². Three natural compounds 1³, 2⁴ and 3⁵ (gingerone C) having 1,7-diaryl-4-hepten-3-one skeleton were isolated from the rhizomes of Alpinia offocinarum, the wood of Alnus japonica and the rhizomes of Zingiber officinale respectively. Their structures were elucidated as 1,7-diphenylhept-4-en-3-one(1), 1,7-bis(4-hydroxyphenyl)hept-4-en-3-one(2) and 1-(3-hydroxyl-4-methoxyphenyl)-7-(4-hydroxyphenyl)hept-4-en-3-one(3) by spectral method. Herein, we wish to report facile total synthesis of these three natural compounds. Their synthetic routes were shouwn in scheme.