Synthesis of (15N2)[17O]Urea, (15N2)[O2, O4-17O2]Uridine,and (15N3)[O2-17O]Cytidine

A general synthetic approach for the synthesis of ¹⁵N- and ¹⁷O-doubly labelled pyrimidine nucleosides is described. The ¹⁵N isotopes in uridine and the ¹⁷O isotope in the urea-derived carbonyl group of uridine and cytidine originate from (¹⁵N₂)[¹⁷O]urea ( 5 ) which was synthesized from ¹⁵NH₄Cl, thiophosgene ( 1 ), and H₂[¹⁷O]. The third ¹⁵N isotope of cytidine in 4-position stems from the substitution of the 1,2,4-triazole moiety of (¹⁵N₂)[O²-¹⁷O]uridine derivative 8a/b with ¹⁵NH₄OH. Hydrolysis of the same key intermediate 8a/b with Na[¹⁷O]H/H₂[¹⁷O] introduced the second ¹⁷O isotope into the 4-position of uridine. The ¹⁵N- and ¹⁷O-NMR spectra of the target compounds 12 and 14 in phosphate-buffered H₂O serve as references for heteronuclear NMR spectra of labelled RNA fragments.