Hydrolysis of Amino Acid Esters and Amides

The metal-accelerated hydrolysis of amino acid esters or amides comprises one of the best investigated types of metal-mediated reaction (Fig. 3-7). One of the reasons for this is the involvement of chelating ligands, which allows chemical characterisation of intermediates and products in favourable cases, and allows detailed mechanistic studies to be made. The reactions have obvious biological relevance and may provide good working models for the role of metals in metalloproteins. 

The rates of hydrolysis of amino acid esters or amides are often accelerated a million times or so by the addition of simple metal salts. Salts of nickel(n), copper(n), zinc(n) and cobalt(m) have proved to be particularly effective for this. The last ion is non-labile and reactions are sufficiently slow to allow both detailed mechanistic studies and the isolation of intermediates, whereas in the case of the other ions ligand exchange processes are sufficiently rapid that numerous solution species are often present. Over the past thirty years the interactions of metal ions with amino acid derivatives have been investigated intensively, and the interested reader is referred to the suggestions for further reading at the end of the book for more comprehensive treatments of this interesting and important area. 

What effect does co-ordination of the amino acid derivative 3.1 have upon the rate of hydrolysis The rates of the hydrolysis reactions depicted in Fig. 3-8 are only slightly more rapid than those of the free amino acid esters, and, in general, the rates of reactions involving monodentate TV-bonded ligands very closely resemble those for acid-catalysed hydration. This monodentate bonding mode is only exhibited with non-labile ions such as cobalt(m) or chromium(m) and is relatively rare even then. 

Rate enhancements of 104 - 106 are typically associated with the formation of chelated complexes in which the carbonyl oxygen atom is also co-ordinated to the metal (3.2). This results in a considerably greater polarisation of the C-0 bond. 

3 Reactions of Co-ordinated Carbonyl Compounds with Nucleophiles 

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Figure 3-7. Hydrolysis of amino acid esters and amides.

Similar mechanisms may be proposed for the hydrolysis of amino acid esters and amides co-ordinated to labile metal centres such as copper(n) or nickel(n), although mechanistic studies at these centres are much more difficult to perform in view of the rapidity of ligand exchange processes. Further complications arise from the formation of insoluble or colloidal suspensions of metal oxides and hydroxides at higher pH values. In general,... 

The classification outlined here is presented mainly for convenience in arranging and relating a wealth of material. Enzymes display an amazing specificity in the reactions each will catalyze. Despite this, these classifications do not represent absolutes in specificity. Some proteinases will, for instance, catalyze the hydrolysis of amino acid esters and amides as well as peptides. 

Hydrolysis of Amino Acid Esters and Amides and Peptides... 

In the case of amino acid ester and amide complexes, the intramolecular hydrolysis reaction was not observed directly, but was deduced from the results of lsO tracer studies. However, recently the cis-hydroxo and cis-aqua complexes derived from the bis(ethylenediamine)cobalt(III) system, containing glycinamide, glycylglycine and isopropylglycylglycinate, have been isolated and their subsequent cyclization studied over the pH range 0-14.160,161... 

The cobalt(III)-promoted hydrolysis of amino acid esters and peptides and the application of cobalt(III) complexes to the synthesis of small peptides has been reviewed. The ability of a metal ion to cooperate with various inter- and intramolecular acids and bases and promote amide hydrolysis has been investigated. The cobalt complexes (5-10) were prepared as potential substrates for amide hydrolysis. Phenolic and carboxylic functional groups were placed within the vicinity of cobalt(III) chelated amides, to provide models for zinc-containing peptidases such as carboxypeplidase A. The incorporation of a phenol group as in (5) and (6) enhanced the rate of base hydrolysis of the amide function by a factor of 10 -fold above that due to the metal alone. Intramolecular catalysis by the carboxyl group in the complexes (5) and (8) was not observed. The results are interpreted in terms of a bifunctional mechanism for tetrahedral intermediate breakdown by phenol. 

One reason for an otherwise apparently excessive interest in Co(trien)X2+ systems is the use of ds-Co(OH)(trien)(OH2)2+ in the hydrolysis of amino acid esters, amino acid amides and peptides785 to form cis-px- and cis-/J2-Co(trien)(aa)2+ (aa = amino acid) complexes.16 In principle, a peptide could be degraded in a stepwise manner and each amino acid residue successively characterized. By the introduction of a chiral center into the backbone of the trien moiety, it was hoped to make such reactions stereoselective. Consequently, while fully A-alkylated trien systems have been widely investigated for M11 central ions, the C-alkylated trien systems have been almost exclusively the reserve of the Co111 chemist (Table 11). 

THE HYDROLYSIS OF AMINO ACID ESTERS, AMIDES AND PEPTIDES 414... 

We saw in Chapter 3 that the hydrolysis of chelated amino acid esters and amides was dramatically accelerated by the nucleophilic attack of external hydroxide ion or water and that cobalt(m) complexes provided an ideal framework for the mechanistic study of these reactions. Some of the earlier studies were concerned with the reactions of the cations [Co(en)2Cl(H2NCH2C02R)]2+, which contained a monodentate amino acid ester. In many respects these proved to be an unfortunate choice in that a number of mechanisms for their hydrolysis may be envisaged. The first involved attack by external hydroxide upon the monodentate A-bonded ester (Fig. 5-62). This process is little accelerated by co-ordination in a monodentate manner. 

Co(trien)(NH3)2] + has been isolated, and only the meso trans isomers (197-198) with two different axial ligands, remain to be distinguished. There is also an extensive chemistry of N and C-alkylated derivatives of (178 180) as cA-[Co(OH)(trien)(OH2)] assists the hydrolysis of amino acid esters, amino acid amides, and peptides to form cis-fi (194) and cA-jS2-[Co(OA0(trien)] + (195)(( A = amino acid) complexes. Chiral alkylated trien ligands have the potential for chiral stereospecificity in such reactions. 

Attack as a Nucleophile. Hydrolysis of esters or amides can occur through the nucleophilic attack of metal-bound hydroxide ions, as exemplified by N (49, 50). In most cases, however, this mechanism is not easily differentiated from the kinetically equivalent attack by hydroxide ion at the metal-bound carbonyl carbon (A) (38). In the case of substitutionaUy inert complexes of Co(lll), 0-tracer experiments revealed that both of the two mechanisms occur in the hydrolysis of the bound amino acid esters and amides (36, 49, 51, 52). At a pH 7-8, ionization of Co(III)-bound amide I (R = H) produced N in >90% of the total concentration, and N was hydrolyzed with a half-life of 100 min at 20°C (36). 

Both alkaline proteases form an intermediate, the acyl-enzyme complex, on the reaction coordinate from the amino acid component to the dipeptide, which is formed by the triad Ser-(or Cys-)-His-Asp (or -Glu) (see Chapter 9, Section 9.5). The acyl-enzyme complex can be formed with the help of an activated amino acid component such as an amino acid ester. The complex can react either with water to the undesired hydrolysis product, the free amino acid, or with the amine of the nucleophile, such as an amino acid ester or amide, to the desired dipeptide. The particular advantage of enzyme-catalyzed peptide synthesis rests in the biocatalyst specificity with respect to particular amino acids in electrophile and nucleophile positions. Figure 7.26 illustrates the principle of kinetically and thermodynamically controlled peptide synthesis while Table 7.3 elucidates the specificity of some common proteases. 

A useful approach for the preparation of chiral (3-aminophospho-nic acids from the naturally occurring a-amino acids has been reported.139 The overall scheme (Equation 3.4) involves formation of the phthalimide-acid halide from the starting a-amino acid followed by a Michaelis-Arbuzov reaction with triethyl phosphite to give the acylphosphonate. Complete reduction of the carbonyl group in three steps followed by hydrolysis of the ester and amide linkages provides the target material in very high yield without racemization (>99% ee). 

The hydrolysis of esters (and amides) by chymotrypsin satisfies these criteria. The hydrolysis of, say, acetyl-L-tryptophan p-i itrophenyl ester forms an acylen-/yme that reacts with various amines such as hydroxylamine, alaninamide, hydrazine, etc., and also with alcohols such as methanol, to give the hydroxamic acid, dipeptide, hydrazide, and methyl ester, respectively, of acetyl-L-tryptophan. The same acylenzyme is generated in the hydrolysis of the phenyl, methyl, ethyl, etc., esters of the amino acid (and also during the hydrolysis of amides). 

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