Asymmetric synthesis of l-thienylalanines

Reprogramming natural proteins using unnatural amino acids

Unnatural amino acids have gained significant attention in protein engineering and drug discovery as they allow the evolution of proteins with enhanced stability and activity. The incorporation of unnatural amino acids into proteins offers a rational approach to engineer enzymes for designing efficient biocatalysts that exhibit versatile physicochemical properties and biological functions. This review highlights the biological and synthetic routes of unnatural amino acids to yield a modified protein with altered functionality and their incorporation methods. Unnatural amino acids offer a wide array of applications such as antibody-drug conjugates, probes for change in protein conformation and structure-activity relationships, peptide-based imaging, antimicrobial activities, etc. Besides their emerging applications in fundamental and applied science, systemic research is necessary to explore unnatural amino acids with novel side chains that can address the limitations of natural amino acids.

Overview on Multienzymatic Cascades for the Production of Non-canonical α-Amino Acids

The 22 genetically encoded amino acids (AAs) present in proteins (the 20 standard AAs together with selenocysteine and pyrrolysine), are commonly referred as proteinogenic AAs in the literature due to their appearance in ribosome-synthetized polypeptides. Beyond the borders of this key set of compounds, the rest of AAs are generally named imprecisely as non-proteinogenic AAs, even when they can also appear in polypeptide chains as a result of post-transductional machinery. Besides their importance as metabolites in life, many of D-α- and L-α-"non-canonical" amino acids (NcAAs) are of interest in the biotechnological and biomedical fields. They have found numerous applications in the discovery of new medicines and antibiotics, drug synthesis, cosmetic, and nutritional compounds, or in the improvement of protein and peptide pharmaceuticals. In addition to the numerous studies dealing with the asymmetric synthesis of NcAAs, many different enzymatic pathways have been reported in the literature allowing for the biosynthesis of NcAAs. Due to the huge heterogeneity of this group of molecules, this review is devoted to provide an overview on different established multienzymatic cascades for the production of non-canonical D-α- and L-α-AAs, supplying neophyte and experienced professionals in this field with different illustrative examples in the literature. Whereas the discovery of new or newly designed enzymes is of great interest, dusting off previous enzymatic methodologies by a "back and to the future" strategy might accelerate the implementation of new or improved multienzymatic cascades.

A New Route to Non-Natural Aryl-Containing Amino Acids and Their Precursors from Thiophenes

Thiophenes may be converted to substituted arenes by oxidative cycloaddition to alkynes or by oxidative cycloaddition to alkenes with subsequent oxidative SO-extrusion. Cyano- and acetylamino-groups do not interfere in the reaction and are stable under the reaction conditions. This transformation can be used as a novel route to non-natural aryl-containing amino acids.

Synthesis of 2-furyl-4-arylidene-5(4H)-oxazolones as new potent antibacterial agents against phyto-pathogenic and nitrifying bacteria

Crop losses due to bacterial pathogens are a major global concern. Most of the available pesticides for these pathogens suffer from various drawbacks such as complicated synthesis, high cost, high toxicity, pesticide resistance and environmental hazards. To overcome these drawbacks, the present study was undertaken to find a potent bactericide. Therefore, a series of compounds comprising bioactive furyl and oxazolone rings was synthesized under microwave irradiation and screened for in vitro antibacterial activity. The reactions were completed in fewer than 2 minutes with minimal use of solvents and resulted in high yields. These compounds were screened for antibacterial activity against plant pathogens, Xanthomonas oryzae, Ralstonia solanacearum and nitrifying bacteria, Nitrosomonas species under laboratory conditions. Five compounds were active as antibacterial agents against Xanthomonas oryzae and Ralstonia solanacearum. However, all compounds were effective against the Nitrosomonas species and the best one was 2-furyl-4-(3-methoxy-4-hydroxybenzylidene)-5(4H)-oxazolone. The study revealed the fast and environmentally friendly synthesis of bioactive title compounds, which also hold promise to be used as prototypes for the discovery of potent analogues.

2-(Naphthalen-1-yl)-4-(naphthalen-1-yl-methyl-idene)-1,3-oxazol-5(4H)-one

In the title compound, C₂₄H₁₅NO₂, the oxazole ring is oriented at dihedral angles of 10.09 (4) and 6.04 (4)° with respect to the mean planes of the naphthalene ring systems, while the two naphthalene ring systems make a dihedral angle of 4.32 (3)°. Intra­molecular C—H⋯N hydrogen bonds link the oxazole N atom to the naphthalene ring systems. In the crystal, inter­molecular weak C—H⋯O hydrogen bonds link the mol­ecules into centrosymmetric dimers. π–π contacts between the oxazole and naphthalene rings and between the naphthalene ring systems [centroid–centroid distances = 3.5947 (9) and 3.7981 (9) Å] may further stabilize the crystal structure. Three weak C—H⋯π inter­actions also occur.

Pseudo-peptides derived from isomannide: inhibitors of serine proteases

In this paper, we describe the synthesis of a novel class of pseudo-peptides derived from isomannide and several oxazolones as potential inhibitors of serine proteases as well as preliminary pharmacological assays for hepatitis C. Hepatitis C, dengue and West Nile fever are among the most important flaviviruses that share one important serine protease enzyme. Serine proteases belong to the most studied class of proteolytic enzymes and are a primary target in the drug development field. Several pseudo-peptides were obtained in good yields from the reaction of isomannide and oxazolones, and their anti-HCV potential using the HCV replicon-based assay was shown.

A high-throughput and generic assay method for the determination of substrate specificities of thermophilic α-aminotransferases

For the determination of substrate specificities of thermophilic alpha-aminotransferases (AATs), a novel high-throughput assay method was developed. In this method, a thermophilic omega-aminotransferase (OAT) and a thermophilic aldehyde dehydrogenase (ALDH) are coupled to the AAT reaction. Glutamic acid is used as an amino group donor for the AAT reaction yielding 2-oxoglutalic acid. 2-Oxoglutalic acid produced by the AAT reaction is used as an amino group acceptor in the OAT reaction regenerating glutamic acid. The amino group donor of the OAT reaction is 5-aminopentanoic acid yielding pentanedioic acid semialdehyde which is oxidized by ALDH to pentanedioic acid with concomitant reduction of NADP(+) to NADPH. NADPH thus produced then reduces colorless tetrazolium salt into colored formazan. To construct such a reaction system, the genes for a thermophilic AAT, a thermophilic OAT and a thermophilic ALDH were cloned and expressed in Escherichia coli. These enzymes were subsequently purified and used to determine the activities of AAT for the synthesis of unnatural amino acids. This method allowed the clear detection of the AAT activities as it measures the increase in the absorbance on a low background absorbance reading.

Oxazolones: New tyrosinase inhibitors; synthesis and their structure–activity relationships

The tyrosinase inhibitory potential of seventeen synthesized oxazolone derivatives has been evaluated and their structure-activity relationships developed in the present work. All the synthesized derivatives, 3-19, demonstrated excellent in vitro tyrosinase inhibitory properties having IC50 values in the range of 1.23+/-0.37-17.73+/-2.69 microM, whereas standard inhibitors l-mimosine and kojic acid have IC50 values 3.68+/-0.02 and 16.67+/-0.52 microM,, respectively. Compounds 4-8 having IC50 values 3.11+/-0.95, 3.51+/-0.25, 3.23+/-0.66, 1.23 +/- 0.37, and 2.15+/-0.75, respectively, were found to be very active members of the series, even better than both the standard inhibitors. However, compounds 3, 9-11, 13, 14, 16, 17, and 19 were found to be better than kojic acid but not l-mimosine. (2-Methyl-4-[E,2Z)-3-phenyl-2-propenyliden]-1,3-oxazol-5(4H)-one (7) bearing a cinnamyol residue at C-4 of oxazolone moiety and an IC50 = 1.23+/-0.37 microM was found to be the most active one among all tested compounds. These studies reveal that the substitution of functional group (s) at C-4 and C-2 positions plays a vital role in the activity of this series of compounds. It is concluded that compound 7 may act as a potential lead molecule to develop new drugs for the treatment of tyrosinase based disorders.

The interaction of heteroaryl-acrylates and alanines with phenylalanine ammonia-lyase from parsley

Acrylic acids and alanines substituted with heteroaryl groups at the beta-position were synthesized and spectroscopically characterized (UV, HRMS, (1)H NMR, and (13)C NMR spectroscopy). The heteroaryl groups were furanyl, thiophenyl, benzofuranyl, and benzothiophenyl and contained the alanyl side chains either at the 2- or 3-positions. While the former are good substrates for phenylalanine ammonia-lyase (PAL), the latter compounds are inhibitors. Exceptions are thiophen-3-yl-alanine, a moderate substrate and furan-3-yl-alanine, which is inert. Possible reasons for these exceptions are discussed. Starting from racemic heteroaryl-2-alanines their D-enantiomers were prepared by using a stereodestructive procedure. From the heteroaryl-2-acrylates, the L-enantiomers of the heteroaryl-2-alanines were prepared at high ammonia concentration. These results can be best explained by a Friedel-Crafts-type electrophilic attack at the aromatic part of the substrates as the initial step of the PAL reaction.

Synthesis and activity of novel analogs of hemiasterlin as inhibitors of tubulin polymerization: modification of the A segment

Analogs of hemiasterlin (1) and HTI-286 (2), which contain various aromatic rings in the A segment, were synthesized as potential inhibitors of tubulin polymerization. The structure-activity relationships related to stereo- and regio-chemical effects of substituents on the aromatic ring in the A segment were studied. Analogs, which carry a meta-substituted phenyl ring in the A segment show comparable activity for inhibition of tubulin polymerization to 2, as well as in the cell proliferation assay using KB cells containing P-glycoprotein, compared to those of 1 and 2.

Synthesis and immunomodulatory properties of selected oxazolone derivatives

Eleven oxazolone derivatives were synthesized and characterized by (1)H NMR, EI, IR and UV spectroscopic and CHN analysis. Three compounds, 4-[(E)-(4-nitrophenyl)methylidene]-2-phenyl-1,3-oxazol-5(4H)-one (11), 4-[(E)-(4-methoxyphenyl)methylidene]-2-methyl-1,3-oxazol-5-one (12) and 4-[(E)-(4-nitrophenyl)methylidene]-2-methyl-1,3-oxazol-5(4H)-one (13) were screened for phagocyte chemiluminescence, neutrophil chemotaxis, T-cell proliferation, cytokine production from mononuclear cells and cytotoxicity. 4-[(E)-(4-Nitrophenyl)methylidene]-2-methyl-1,3-oxazol-5(4H)-one (13) was found to be the most potent immunomodulator in the series.

Novel biosynthetic approaches to the production of unnatural amino acids using transaminases

Transaminase enzymes are being increasingly applied to the large-scale synthesis of unnatural and nonproteinogenic amino acids. Typically displaying relaxed substrate specificity, rapid reaction rates and lacking the need for cofactor regeneration, they possess many characteristics that make them desirable as effective biocatalysts. By judiciously combining the transaminase reaction with additional enzymatic steps, this approach can be used very efficiently to prepare a broad range of D- and L-amino acids.