A synthesis of α-aminophosphonate analogs of polyoxins, termed phosphonoxin C1, C2 and C3, has been achieved. The key step was the addition of lithium dimethyl phosphite to the aldehyde of a protected threose derivative. α-Hydroxyphosphonate analogs C4 and C5 were also obtained by taking advantage of an unprecedented conversion of an azide to hydroxyl during treatment with hydrogen on palladium on carbon. The resulting phosphonoxin C5 inhibited the growth of an intestinal protozoan, Giardia lamblia, at low micromolar concentration.The natural products polyoxins isolated from the Streptomyces species, are a closely related class of peptidylnucleoside antibiotics.1 They have shown to be potent inhibitors of many types of fungi and parasites due to their ability to disrupt cell envelope biosynthesis.2 For example, one such parasite is Giardia Lamblia , 3 a protozoan parasite that colonizes and replicates in the intestinal tract. It is one of the most common causes of diarrhea in the developed world and is not only restricted to humans, but affects livestock and companion animals, where there are an estimated 100 million cases per year worldwide.4 Therefore, the need for effective treatment continues to this date. Polyoxins5 most likely act by mimicking the stucture of, and thereby competing with, the natural substrate for cell envelope biosynthesis, uridine diphosphoryl-N-acetylglucosamine (UDP-GlcNAc, Figure 1).6 They have exhibited activity against many types of fungi7 and inhibit cell wall formation in Entamoeba.8 However, utility of these natural products as drugs is compromised by their poor bioavailability and metabolic instability resulting in low efficacy evidenced by high inhibitory concentrations against fungal pathogens.9 Over the years many groups have synthesized polyoxin analogs with the goal of obtaining compounds that would retain the anti-fungal and anti-parasitic activity of polyoxins but could be more suitable as drugs.5 , 10We recently published the synthesis of a new class of polyoxin analogs, termed phosphonoxins, that replaced the peptide linkage to the nucleoside with a phosphonate linkage.11 , 12 Phosphonates are chemically and enzymatically stable and many such patte219@umn.edu. Supporting Information Available. Experimental procedures, spectral data for all compounds and X-ray data for compound 12. This material is available free of charge via the Internet at http://pubs.acs.org. Figure 1) is a potent inhibitor of Giardia trophozoite growth and cyst formation in vitro.11 We also synthesized phosphonoxins B1 and B2, which more closely resemble the structure of the natural polyoxins.12
NIH Public AccessWe report here the synthesis of phosphonoxins C1 (1) and C2 (2), which differ from the phosphonoxins B only in that they do not possess the methylene spacer between the amino phosphorus groups; they are α-instead of β-aminophosphonates. During the course of this synthesis we also obtained α-hydroxyphosphonate analogs, phosphonoxins C4 (4) and C5 (5), by the unexpected conversion of a...