Covalent inhibitors are viable therapeutics. However, off-target reactivity challenges the field. Chemists have attempted to solve this issue by varying the reactivity attributes of electrophilic warheads. Here, we report the development of an approach to increase the selectivity of covalent molecules that is independent of warhead reactivity features and can be used in concert with existing methods. Using the scaffold of the Bruton's tyrosine kinase (BTK) inhibitor Ibrutinib for our proof-of-concept, we reasoned that increasing the steric bulk of fumarate-based electrophiles on Ibrutinib should improve selectivity via the steric exclusion of off-targets but retain rates of cysteine reactivity comparable to that of an acrylamide. Using chemical proteomic techniques, we demonstrate that elaboration of the electrophile to a tert-butyl (t-Bu) fumarate ester decreases time-dependent offtarget reactivity and abolishes time-independent off-target reactivity. While an alkyne-bearing probe analogue of Ibrutinib has 247 protein targets, our t-Bu fumarate probe analogue has only 7. Of these 7 targets, BTK is the only time-independent target. The t-Bu inhibitor itself is also more selective for BTK, reducing off-targets by 70%. We investigated the consequences of treatment with Ibrutinib and our t-Bu analogue and discovered that only 8 proteins are downregulated in response to treatment with the t-Bu analogue compared to 107 with Ibrutinib. Of these 8 proteins, 7 are also downregulated by Ibrutinib and a majority of these targets are associated with BTK biology. Taken together, these findings reveal an opportunity to increase cysteine-reactive covalent inhibitor selectivity through electrophilic structure optimization.

Aztreonam, first discovered in 1980, is an FDA approved, intravenous, monocyclic beta-lactam antibiotic. Aztreonam is active against Gram-negative bacteria and is still used today. The oral bioavailability of aztreonam in humans is less than 1%. Herein we describe the design and synthesis of potential oral prodrugs of aztreonam.

The azetidine group is frequently encountered within contemporary medicinal chemistry where it is viewed as a privileged structure. However, the introduction of an azetidine can be synthetically challenging. Herein, a straightforward one step synthesis of azetidine-3-amines, starting from a bench stable, commercial material is presented. The reaction tolerates functional groups commonly encountered in biological-, medicinal-and agro-chemistry, and proceeds in moderateto-high yield with secondary amines, and moderate-to-low yield with primary amines. The methodology compares favorably to recent alternative procedures and can be utilized in "any-stage" functionalization, including late-stage azetidinylation of approved drugs and other compounds with pharmacological activity. ASSOCIATED CONTENT Supporting Information. Expanded experimental procedures and analytical data (1 H, 13 C, 19 F NMR, HPLC) for all new compounds (PDF). The Supporting Information is available free of charge on the Internet at http://pubs.acs.org.

<div> <p>The azetidine group is frequently encountered within contemporary medicinal chemistry where it is viewed as a privileged structure. However, the introduction of an azetidine can be synthetically challenging. Herein, a straight-forward one step synthesis of azetidine-3-amines, starting from a bench stable, commercial material is presented. The reaction tolerates functional groups commonly encountered in biological-, medicinal- and agro-chemistry, and proceeds in moderate-to-high yield with secondary amines, and moderate-to-low yield with primary amines. The methodology compares favorably to recent alternative procedures and can be utilized in “any-stage” functionalization, including late-stage azetidinylation of approved drugs and other compounds with pharmacological activity.</p> </div>

<div> <p>The azetidine group is frequently encountered within contemporary medicinal chemistry where it is viewed as a privileged structure. However, the introduction of an azetidine can be synthetically challenging. Herein, a straight-forward one step synthesis of azetidine-3-amines, starting from a bench stable, commercial material is presented. The reaction tolerates functional groups commonly encountered in biological-, medicinal- and agro-chemistry, and proceeds in moderate-to-high yield with secondary amines, and moderate-to-low yield with primary amines. The methodology compares favorably to recent alternative procedures and can be utilized in “any-stage” functionalization, including late-stage azetidinylation of approved drugs and other compounds with pharmacological activity.</p> </div>