Minor alkaloids

LELOBINE AND LOBININE GROUPS. These include the minor alkaloids of lobelia isolated from factory residues accumulated during the manufacture of lobeline. Their isolation and separation involve complicated processes of fractionation for which the original paper should be consulted. Their inter-relationships (Table A, p. 23 and general formula, I, p. 24) are similar to those among members of the lobeline group, but the effect of the presence of three or more asymmetric carbon atoms is more evident, thus there are already known six forms of the basic dihydric alcohol, lelobaiiidine. 

Two minor alkaloids of ipecacuanha, ipecamine and hydroipecamine, have been described by Hesse, and are discussed by Pyman. ... 

Chou has described recently the isolation of four minor alkaloids from F. Roylei they occur in the drug to the extent of 0-001 to 0-002 per cent. 

Distillation of geissospermine with zinc dust affords 3-ethylpyridine, identified as the picrate, m.p. 126°, and platinichloride, m.p. 183°, and ah indole base giving a picrate, m.p. 256-7° (dec.). The mixed minor alkaloids accompanying geissospermine, on distillation with zinc dust, gave (1) a base forming a picrate, m.p. 128-130°, and a platinichloride, m.p. 188-190°, which may be 2-methyl-6-ethylpyridine, and (2) a hydrocarbon, m.p. 44-5 to 45-5°. 

As in the case of the steroids, introduction of additional nuclear substituents yields morphine analogs of increased potency. The more important of these are derived from one of the minor alkaloids that occur in opium. Thebaine (14), present in crude opium in about one-tenth the amount of morphine, exhibits a reactive internal diene system that is well known to undergo various addition reactions in a 1,4 manner (e.g., bromination). Thus, reaction with hydrogen peroxide in acid may be visualized to afford first the 14-hydroxy-6-hemiketal (15). Hydrolysis yields the isolated unsaturated ketone (16). Catalytic reduction... 

Papaverine (107) is among the host of minor alkaloids that have been isolated from opium. The compound is distinct in its biologic activity from many of the other opium constituents in that it does not exhibit any analgesic activity. Instead, papaverine acts as a nonspecific spasmolytic agent. As such, it has found... 

Precursors and Formation. Tobaccos used for commercial products in the U.S.A, contain between 0,5 and 2,7% alkaloids. Nicotine constitutes 85-95% of the total alkaloids (14,26,27). Important minor alkaloids are nornicotine, anatabine, anabasine, cotinine and N -formylnornicotine (Figure 6), Several of these alkaloids are secondary and tertiary amines and, as such, amenable to N-nitrosation. The N-nitrosated alkaloids identified to date in tobacco and tobacco smoke include N -nitrosonornico-tine (NNN), 4-(methylnitrosamino)-l-(3-pyridyl)-l-butanone (NNK) and N -nitrosoanatabine (NAT Figure 7). In model experiments, nitrosation of nicotine also yielded 4-(methylnitrosamino)-4-(3-pyridyl)butanal (NNA 28). 

The minor alkaloid 21-oxogelsemine (3) was isolated from G. sempervirens by the combination of column chromatography, TLC, and preparative gas... 

The minor alkaloid gelsedine, originally isolated from G. sempervirens in 1953 (3), has also been found in G. elegans (19). The structure of gelsedine (6) has been determined by means of H-NMR and mass spectral analysis (4,9)... 

Peripentadenia is a monotypic genus of the family Elaeocarpaceae represented by Peripentadenia mearsii (C. T. White) L. S. Smith, a tree growing in rain forests of northern Queensland. Besides unidentified minor alkaloids, the species yields one major alkaloid, peripentadenine (49) (87). Its molecular formula, C22H34N203, was established by high-resolution mass spectroscopy the presence of phenol, ketone, secondary amide, and tertiary amine functionalities was deduced from examination of spectroscopic data. 

The chemistry of pepper has long been studied and the pungent principle of black pepper—a piperidine alkaloid, piperine 134—was isolated as early as 1877 (201). Its synthesis from the acid and piperidine was accomplished in 1882. (202). The corresponding pyrrolidine alkaloid trichostachyne (135) was isolated some 100 years later from several Piper species (see below). The cooccurence of piperidine and pyrrolidine alkaloids is a common feature of the chemistry of pepper. In many cases, the crude alkaloid extract is first cleaved with acids or bases and then each alkaloid is reconstituted by selective amidation. For the sake of unity, this chapter will be limited to comments on pyrrolidines, even in cases where they are minor alkaloids. 

In an effort to identify possible sources of the 16 alkaloids found in the skin of the Panamanian poison frog Dendrobates auratus, ants from a total of 61 terrestrial nests were analyzed [124]. The alate queens of one species of myr-micine ants (Solenopsis (Diplorhoptrum) sp.) collected at Cerro Ancon were found to contain the decahydroquinoline (-)-ds-195A (112) which was also present as a minor alkaloid in the skin of the microsympatric population of D. auratus. Moreover, from wingless ants of two nests collected at Isla Taboga and identified as Megalomyrmex silvestrU the same workers isolated the stereo-isomeric 3,5-disubstituted pyrrolizidines rfs-251 K (117) and trans-251 K (118) in the same ratio 3 1 that was present in the skin of a microsympatric population of D. auratus (Fig. 20) [124]. 

The primary alkaloid in tobacco is nicotine, but tobacco also contains small amounts of minor alkaloids such as anabasine, anatabine, myosmine, and others. The minor alkaloids are absorbed systemically and can be measured in the urine of smokers and users of smokeless tobacco (Jacob et al. 1999). The measurement of minor alkaloids is a way to quantitate tobacco use when a person is also taking in pure nicotine from a nicotine medication or a nontobacco nicotine delivery system. This method has been used to assess tobacco abstinence in clinical trials of smoking cessation with treatment by nicotine medications (Jacob et al. 2002). 

Tobacco use is primarily due to psychopharmacological effects of nicotine (Henningfleld et al. 2006). Nicotine is a tobacco alkaloid, a basic substance that contains a cychc nitrogenous nucleus. In Nicotiana plants, most alkaloids are 3-pyridyl derivatives In cured leaf of Maryland Robinson Medium Broadleaf, 24 pyridine derivatives were identified, including nicotine, nomicotine, anabasine, oxynicotine, myosmine, 3-acetylpyridine, 2,3 -dipyridyl, iticotinamide, anatabine, nicotinic acid, and unidentified pyridine alkaloids of derivatives thereof (Tso 1990). Nicotine is the principal alkaloid in commercial tobacco (this was confirmed in 34 out of 65 Nicotiana species) nomicotine, rather than nicotine, appears to be the main alkaloid in 19 out of 65 species and anabasine is the third most important. In addition to the above-mentioned principal and minor alkaloids, the presence of many trace amounts of new alkaloids or their derivatives were frequently reported, including, for example, 2.4 -dipyridyl, 4,4 -dipyridyl, N -formylanabasine, A -formylanatabine, N -acetylanatabine, N -hexanoyl-nomicotine, N -octanoyl-nomicotine, T-(6-hydroxyoctanoyl) nomicotine, and l -(7-hydroxyoctanoyl) nor-nicotine. 

Coupling ortho to the phenol group in the tetrahydroisoquinoline and para to the phenol in the benzyl substituent then yields the dienone salutaridine, found as a minor alkaloid constituent in the opium poppy. Only the original benzyl aromatic ring can be restored to aromaticity, since the tetrahydroisoquinoline fragment becomes coupled para to the phenol function, a position that is already substituted. 

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