Decarboxylation biological

Ornithine-Derived Alkaloids. Ornithine (23) undergoes biological decarboxylation reductively to generate either putrescine [110-60-1] (36), or its biological equivalent, and subsequent oxidation and cyclization gives rise to the pyrroline [6724-81-2], (37), C H N. 

Biosynthesis. Two closely related genes encode the three mammalian tachykinins. The preprotachykinin A gene encodes both substance P and substance K, while the preprotachykinin B gene encodes neuromedin K (45—47). The active sequences are flanked by the usual double-basic amino acid residues, and the carboxy-terrninal amino acid is a glycine residue which is decarboxylated to an amide. As with most neuropeptide precursors, intermediates in peptide processing can be detected, but their biological activities are not clear (ca 1994). 

One of the amino acids in Table 27.1 is the biological precursor to y-aminobutyric acid (4-aminobutanoic acid), which it forms by a decarboxylation reaction. Which amino acid is this ... 

The biologically active form of vitamin Bg is pyridoxal-5-phosphate (PEP), a coenzyme that exists under physiological conditions in two tautomeric forms (Figure 18.25). PLP participates in the catalysis of a wide variety of reactions involving amino acids, including transaminations, a- and /3-decarboxylations, /3- and ") eliminations, racemizations, and aldol reactions (Figure 18.26). Note that these reactions include cleavage of any of the bonds to the amino acid alpha carbon, as well as several bonds in the side chain. The remarkably versatile chemistry of PLP is due to its ability to... 

Mammals can add additional double bonds to unsaturated fatty acids in their diets. Their ability to make arachidonic acid from linoleic acid is one example (Figure 25.15). This fatty acid is the precursor for prostaglandins and other biologically active derivatives such as leukotrienes. Synthesis involves formation of a linoleoyl ester of CoA from dietary linoleic acid, followed by introduction of a double bond at the 6-position. The triply unsaturated product is then elongated (by malonyl-CoA with a decarboxylation step) to yield a 20-carbon fatty acid with double bonds at the 8-, 11-, and 14-positions. A second desaturation reaction at the 5-position followed by an acyl-CoA synthetase reaction (Chapter 24) liberates the product, a 20-carbon fatty acid with double bonds at the 5-, 8-, IT, and ITpositions. 

The same is true of the thiazole acid 40. Although discovered as a growth factor, it is unable to sustain the growth of a thiazole-deficient mutant of E. coli in a liquid medium. It does not decarboxylate in water solution at pH 7. Phosphate 41 (Scheme 17) is also biologically inactive. In any case, if there is only one metabolic route to the thiazole of thiamine, the very structures of 39 and 40 show that they cannot both be intermediates. 

For quantitative work, it is necessary to estimate the concentration of 5-amino-l-(P-D-ribofuranosyl)imidazole in aqueous solution. It seems that the only available method is the Bratton-Marshall assay, which was originally developed for the estimation of arylamines in biological fluids. The principle of the method is the spectrometric estimation of a salmon-pink colored dyestuff obtained by diazotation in situ, followed by coupling with /V-( 1 -naphthyl)ethyl-enediamine.65 The only remaining problem then is to know the molar extinction of this dye because pure samples of AIRs are not available. A value of 16800 at 520 nM was obtained for the dyes prepared from a model compound, 5-amino-l-cyclohexylimidazole-4-carboxylic acid (54), which is crystalline. A comparable molar extinction can be expected for the dye prepared from imidazole 55, if the carboxyl group does not exert too much influence on the chromophore. Actually, its influence is perceptible even with the naked eye, the dyestuff prepared from 53 having a somewhat different, wine-red color, with max>520 nM. The molar extinction for 55 is 17400 at 500 nM. When the decarboxylation of 54 was conducted under mild acidic conditions (pH 4.8, 50°C, 1 hour), estimation of 5-aminoimidazole 55 by the Bratton-Marshall method led to the conclusion that the reaction was almost quantitative.66 Similar conditions for the final decarboxylation were adopted in the preparation of samples of AIRs labeled with stable isotopes.58... 

Reaction of the thia-amino acid 392 with trifluoroacetic anhydride gave the 2,2,2-trifluoro-l-[7-(trifluoromethyl)-l//-pyrrolo[l,2-c]-[l,3]thiazol-6-yl] ethanone pyrrole 395. The formation of the pyrrole can be rationalized by a sequence involving trifluoroacetylation of the enamine 392 affording dione 393 followed by loss of water and carbon dioxide to give the aromatic product 395. These decarboxylations afford fluorinated derivatives of heterocyclic skeletons known to exhibit interesting biological activity (Scheme 58) <2000T7267>. 

Most coenzymes have aromatic heterocycles as major constituents. While enzymes possess purely protein structures, coenzymes incorporate non-amino acid moieties, most of them aromatic nitrogen het-erocycles. Coenzymes are essential for the redox biochemical transformations, e.g., nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD, 13) and flavin adenine dinucleotide (FAD, 14) (Scheme 5). Both are hydrogen transporters through their tautomeric forms that allow hydrogen uptake at the termini of the quinon-oid chain. Thiamine pyrophosphate (15) is a coenzyme that assists the decarboxylation of pyruvic acid, a very important biologic reaction (Scheme 6). 

Phenylglycines are important components of the vancomycin/teicoplanin antibiotics, and the conforma-tionally restricted amino acids contribute to the unique architecture and biological function of these clinically important NRPs. 4-Hydroxyphenylglycine is produced from L-tyrosine in a pathway that involves three enzymes. In the key step, a nonheme iron oxidase catalyzes the oxidative decarboxylation of the a-keto acid derivative of L-tyrosine resulting in loss of carbon dioxide and generation of the phenylglycine carbon framework. 

Chemical/Physical. Hydrolysis in distilled water at 25 °C produced 3-chloro-2-propen-l-ol and HCl. The reported half-life for this reaction is only 2 d (Kollig, 1993 Milano et al., 1988). trans-1,3-Dichloropropylene was reported to hydrolyze to 3-chloro-2-propen-l-ol and can be biologically oxidized to 3-chloropropenoic acid which is oxidized to formylacetic acid. Decarboxylation of this compound yields carbon dioxide (Connors et al., 1990). Kim et al. (2003) reported that the disappearance of tra 35-l,3-dichloropropylene in water followed a first-order decay model. At 25 and 35 °C, the first-order rate constants were 0.083 and 0.321/d, respectively. The corresponding hydrolysis half-lives were 8.3 and 2.2 d, respectively. 

CASRN 510-15-6 molecular formula C16H14CI2O3 FW 325.21 Biological. Rhodotomla gracilis, a yeast isolated from an insecticide-treated soil, degraded chlorobenzilate in a basal medium supplemented by sucrose. Metabolites identified by this decarboxylation process were 4,4 -dichlorobenzilic acid, 4,4 -dichlorobenzophenone, and carbon dioxide (Miyazaki et al., 1969, 1970). 

CASRN 1918-00-9 molecular formula C8H6CI2O3 FW 221.04 Biological. In a model ecosystem containing sand, water, plants, and biota, dicamba was slowly transformed to 5-hydroxydicamba (10% after 32 d) which slowly underwent decarboxylation (Yu et al., 1975a). 

In this type of spin traps, 5,5-dimethyl-l-pyrroline-Af-oxide (DMPO) deserves particular mention. DMPO is widely employed as a spin trap in the detection of transient radicals or ion-radicals in chemical and biological systems (see, e.g., Siraki et al. 2007). Characteristic ESR spectra arising from the formation of spin adducts are used for identification of specific spin species. In common opinion, such identification is unambiguous. However, in reactions with superoxide ion (Villamena et al. 2004, 2007b), carbon dioxide anion-radical (Villamena et al. 2006), or carbonate anion-radical (Villamena et al. 2007a), this spin trap gives rise to two adducts. Let us consider the case of carbonate anion-radical. The first trapped product arises from direct addition of carbonate anion-radical, second adduct arises from partial decarboxylation of the first one. Scheme 4.25 illustrates such reactions based on the example of carbonate anion-radical. 

The assay of carbenicillin in biological fluids presents problems in that it may be accompanied by traces of benzylpenicillin (probably arising by a-decarboxylation of carbenicillin) to which the usual test organism, Sarcina lutea, is extremely... 

The terminology vitamin Bg covers a number of structurally related compounds, including pyridoxal and pyridoxamine and their 5 -phosphates. Pyridoxal 5 -phosphate (PLP), in particular, acts as a coenzyme for a large number of important enzymic reactions, especially those involved in amino acid metabolism. We shall meet some of these in more detail later, e.g. transamination (see Section 15.6) and amino acid decarboxylation (see Section 15.7), but it is worth noting at this point that the biological role of PLP is absolutely dependent upon imine formation and hydrolysis. Vitamin Bg deficiency may lead to anaemia, weakness, eye, mouth, and nose lesions, and neurological changes. 

The nucleophile in biological Claisen reactions that effectively adds on acetyl-CoA is almost always malonyl-CoA. This is synthesized from acetyl-CoA by a reaction that utilizes a biotin-enzyme complex to incorporate carbon dioxide into the molecule (see Section 15.9). This has now flanked the a-protons with two carbonyl groups, and increases their acidity. The enzymic Claisen reaction now proceeds, but, during the reaction, the added carboxyl is lost as carbon dioxide. Having done its job, it is immediately removed. In contrast to the chemical analogy, a carboxylated intermediate is not formed. Mechanistically, one could perhaps write a concerted decarboxylation-nucleophilic attack, as shown. An alternative rationalization is that decarboxylation of the malonyl ester is used by the enzyme to effectively generate the acetyl enolate anion without the requirement for a strong base. 

True alkaloids derive from amino acid and they share a heterocyclic ring with nitrogen. These alkaloids are highly reactive substances with biological activity even in low doses. All true alkaloids have a bitter taste and appear as a white solid, with the exception of nicotine which has a brown liquid. True alkaloids form water-soluble salts. Moreover, most of them are well-defined crystalline substances which unite with acids to form salts. True alkaloids may occur in plants (1) in the free state, (2) as salts and (3) as N-oxides. These alkaloids occur in a limited number of species and families, and are those compounds in which decarboxylated amino acids are condensed with a non-nitrogenous structural moiety. The primary precursors of true alkaloids are such amino acids as L-ornithine, L-lysine, L-phenylalanine/L-tyrosine, L-tryptophan and L-histidine . Examples of true alkaloids include such biologically active alkaloids as cocaine, quinine, dopamine, morphine and usambarensine (Figure 4). A fuller list of examples appears in Table 1. 

It is an indole ethylamine formed in biological systems from the amino acid L-tryptophan by hydroxylation with tryptophan hydroxylase enzyme, followed by the decarboxylation by the nonspecific aromatic L-amino acid decarboxylase. 5-HT is then taken up into secretory granules and stored. 

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