D -Ribose

D-ribose, CjHioOj. M.p. 87 0. The sugar of ribonucleic acid it is therefore present in all plant and animal cells. It has the furanose structure shown. 

Generating Haworth formulas to show stereochemistry m furanose forms of higher aldoses is slightly more complicated and requires an additional operation Furanose forms of D ribose are frequently encountered building blocks m biologically important organic molecules They result from hemiacetal formation between the aldehyde group and the C 4 hydroxyl... 

Notice that the eclipsed conformation of d ribose derived directly from the Fischer pro jection does not have its C 4 hydroxyl group properly oriented for furanose ring forma tion We must redraw it m a conformation that permits the five membered cyclic hemi acetal to form This is accomplished by rotation about the C(3)—C(4) bond taking care that the configuration at C 4 is not changed... 

Conformation of D ribose suitable for furanose ring formation... 

During the discussion of hemiacetal formation in d ribose in the preceding section you may have noticed that aldopentoses have the potential of forming a six membered cyclic hemiacetal via addition of the C 5 hydroxyl to the carbonyl group This mode of ring closure leads to a and p pyranose forms... 

Because six membered rings are normally less strained than five membered ones pyranose forms are usually present m greater amounts than furanose forms at equilib rium and the concentration of the open chain form is quite small The distribution of carbohydrates among their various hemiacetal forms has been examined by using H and NMR spectroscopy In aqueous solution for example d ribose is found to contain the various a and p furanose and pyranose forms m the amounts shown m Figure 25 5 The concentration of the open chain form at equilibrium is too small to measure directly Nevertheless it occupies a central position m that mterconversions of a and p anomers and furanose and pyranose forms take place by way of the open chain form as an inter mediate As will be seen later certain chemical reactions also proceed by way of the open chain form... 

FIGURE 25 5 Distribution of furanose pyranose and open chain forms of d ribose in aqueous solution as mea sured by H and NMR spectroscopy... 

Of the eight stereoisomeric aldopentoses Figure 25 2 shows the Fischer projections of the d enantiomers (d ribose d arabinose d xylose and D lyxose) Likewise Figure 25 2 gives the Fischer projections of the eight D aldohexoses... 

The numbering scheme used for nucleosides maintains the independence of the two structural units The pyrimidine or purine is numbered m the usual way So is the car bohydrate except that a prime symbol ( ) follows each locant Thus adenosine is a nude oside of D nbose and 2 deoxyadenosine is a nucleoside of 2 deoxy d ribose... 

The same kind of 5 3 phosphodiester units that join the 2 deoxy d ribose units m Figure 28 I are also responsible for connecting nucleosides of d ribose... 

Even if It could be shown that RNA preceded both DNA and proteins in the march toward living things that doesn t automatically make RNA the first self replicating molecule Another possibility is that a self replicating polynucleotide based on some carbo hydrate other than o ribose was a precursor to RNA Over many generations natural selection could have led to the replacement of the other carbohydrate by D ribose giving RNA Recent research on unnatural polynucleotides by Professor Albert Eschenmoser of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (Zurich) has shown for example that nucleic acids based on L threose possess many of the properties of RNA and DNA... 

Section 28 2 Nucleosides are carbohydrate derivatives of pyrimidine and purine bases The most important nucleosides are derived from d ribose and 2 deoxy D ribose... 

Section 28 7 Nucleic acids are polynucleotides present m cells The carbohydrate component is D nbose m ribonucleic acid (RNA) and 2 deoxy d ribose m deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA)... 

Nucleic Acids. Phosphoms is an essential component of nucleic acids, polymers consisting of chains of nucleosides, a sugar plus a nitrogenous base, and joined by phosphate groups (43,44). In ribonucleic acid (RNA), the sugar is D-ribose in deoxyribonucleic acids (DNA), the sugar is 2-deoxy-D-ribose. 

DiaZepin Nucleosides. Four naturally occurring dia2epin nucleosides, coformycin (58), 2 -deoxycoformycin (59), adechlorin or 2 -chloro-2 -deoxycoformycin (60), and adecypenol (61), have been isolated (1—4,174,175). The biosynthesis of (59) and (60) have been reported to proceed from adenosine and C-1 of D-ribose (30,176,177). They are strong inhibitors of adenosine deaminase and AMP deaminase (178). Compound (58) protects adenosine and formycin (12) from deamination by adenosine deaminase. Advanced hairy cell leukemia has shown rapid response to (59) with or without a-or P-interferon treatment (179—187). In addition, (59) affects interleukin-2 production, receptor expression on human T-ceUs, DNA repair synthesis, immunosuppression, natural killer cell activity, and cytokine production (188—194). 

The TK-catalyzed reaction requires the presence of thiamine pyrophosphate and Mg " as cofactors. Although the substrate specificity of the enzyme has not been thoroughly investigated, it has been shown that the enzyme accepts a wide variety of 2-hydroxyaldehydes including D-glyceraldehyde 3-phosphate [591-57-1], D-glyceraldehyde [453-17-8], D-ribose 5-phosphate /47(9(9-2%/7, D-erythrose 4-phosphate and D-erythrose [583-50-6] (139,149—151). 

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