Corrinoids

Various aspects of the chromatography of vitamin B 2 and related corrinoids have been reviewed (59). A high performance Hquid chromatographic (hplc) method is reported to require a sample containing 20—100 p.g cyanocobalamin and is suitable for premixes, raw material, and pharmaceutical products (60). 

A second synthesis of cobyric acid (14) involves photochemical ring closure of an A—D secocorrinoid. Thus, the Diels-Alder reaction between butadiene and /n j -3-methyl-4-oxopentenoic acid was used as starting point for all four ring A—D synthons (15—18). These were combined in the order B + C — BC + D — BCD + A — ABCD. The resultant cadmium complex (19) was photocyclized in buffered acetic acid to give the metal-free corrinoid (20). A number of steps were involved in converting this material to cobyric acid (14). 

W. Friedrich, Vitamin und Verwandte Corrinoide, Georg Thiem, Stuttgart, Germany, 1975, p. 170. 

Scheme 1 outlines the retrosynthetic analysis of the Woodward-Eschenmoser A-B variant of the vitamin B12 (1) synthesis. The analysis begins with cobyric acid (4) because it was demonstrated in 1960 that this compound can be smoothly converted to vitamin B12.5 In two exploratory corrin model syntheses to both approaches to the synthesis of cobyric acid,6 the ability of secocorrinoid structures (e. g. 5) to bind metal atoms was found to be central to the success of the macrocyclization reaction to give intact corrinoid structures. In the Woodward-Eschenmoser synthesis of cobyric acid, the cobalt atom situated in the center of intermediate 5 organizes the structure of the secocorrin, and promotes the cyclization... 

These tautomerization experiments have also been performed with uroporphyrinogens,25e 24 which are important intermediates in the biosynthesis of natural porphinoids and corrinoids. This has led to a deeper insight into biosynthetic pathways and a possible prebiotic origin of... 

Licoccia S, Paolesse R (1995) Metal Complexes of Corroles and other Corrinoids. 84 71-134 Lin Z, Fan M-F (1997) Metal-Metal Interactions in Transition Metal Clusters with n-Donor Ligands. 87 35-80... 

Corrinoid iron-sulfur protein (CFeSP) purified and characterized acetyl-CoA synthesis reconstituted from CH3-H4 folate, CO, and CoA using purified proteins. ... 

Fig. 11. Active sites and reactions of the bifunctional CODH/ACS. For synthesis of acetyl-CoA, two electrons are transferred from external electron donors to Cluster B of the CODH subunit. Electrons are relayed to Cluster C which reduces CO2 to CO. The CO is proposed to be channeled to Cluster A of the ACS subunit to form a metal-CO adduct that combines with the methyl group of the CFeSP and CoA to form acetyl-CoA. For utilization of acetyl-CoA, these reactions are reversed. The abbreviations are CODH, CO dehydrogenase ACS, acetyl-CoA synthase CFeSP, the corrinoid iron-sulfur protein CoA, Coenzyme A.

The third reason for favoring a non-radical pathway is based on studies of a mutant version of the CFeSP. This mutant was generated by changing a cysteine residue to an alanine, which converts the 4Fe-4S cluster of the CFeSP into a 3Fe-4S cluster (14). This mutation causes the redox potential of the 3Fe-4S cluster to increase by about 500 mV. The mutant is incapable of coupling the reduction of the cobalt center to the oxidation of CO by CODH. Correspondingly, it is unable to participate in acetate synthesis from CH3-H4 folate, CO, and CoA unless chemical reductants are present. If mechanism 3 (discussed earlier) is correct, then the methyl transfer from the methylated corrinoid protein to CODH should be crippled. However, this reaction occurred at equal rates with the wild-type protein and the CFeSP variant. We feel that this result rules out the possibility of a radical methyl transfer mechanics and offers strong support for mechanism 1. 

Certain groups of organocobalt(III) complexes have been dealt with in previous reviews. The organo-corrinoids have been mentioned in all reviews on vitamin B, 2 since 1961, when the coenzyme form was identified as an organometallic compound [see, for example, (79, 178) and references therein]. The literature on the corrinoids is too extensive to be treated comprehensively here and for details and references readers are referred to the book on The Inorganic Chemistry of Vitamin B,2 (136)certain other aspects of the organometallic chemistry of cobalt corrinoids are treated elsewhere (137). The pentacyanides were reviewed in 1967 (105), the DMG complexes (cobaloximes) in 1968 (145), and some aspects of salen, BAE, and related complexes in 1970 (17). 

Some surprisingly large and unwieldy organo ligands have been used in the corrinoids [for examples and references see (136)). Of particular interest is the 5-deoxyadenosyl ligand (II) present in some of the naturally occurring forms. 

Isomers are, of course, possible when the equatorial ligand lacks a plane of symmetry, as in the corrinoids [see (HI)]. All the acetamide side chains project to one side of the corrin ring, which we shall call the upper side, and all the propionamide side chains and the nucleotide side chain to the lower side. Isomers are then theoretically possible whenever the two axial ligands are different, and their existence has been shown experimentally for corrinoids where one axial ligand is CN , Me, or Et and the other is H2O or is absent [for further details see Section 8.2 of ref. (136)]. Salen and BAE also show minor deviations from planarity due to the bending of the two halves (mentioned above in Section II,B,2) and to torsion about the C—C bonds in the ethylene bridge (see references in Table I), but these are not expected to give rise to separable isomers. 

Only one optically active simple organocobalt complex has so far been reported, namely [RCo(DMG)2py], where R is the optically active 1-methylheptyl ligand 55). All cobalt corrinoids, where the ring has been... 

In this section, the corrinoids, the other macrocyclic complexes, and the cyanides are dealt with separately (Sections A-C). The preparative organo-metallic chemist will be primarily interested in Sections B and C, whereas... 

A methyl group can be placed on cobalt in dicyano[cobyrinic acid heptamethyl ester] when it is treated with excess methyl magnesium iodide (the ester side chains being converted into tertiary alcohol groups). The alkylation could also be achieved using lithium alkyls (176). Presumably this reaction would be successful with any corrinoid which is soluble in solvents compatible with Grignard reagents. 

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