Multicomponent natural products

Consequently, Chinese and Western medicine vary in fundamental theory, practice, and drugs used. While Western medicine uses pure natural or synthetic compounds aimed at a single target, Chinese medicine uses processed cmde multicomponent natural products, in various combinations and formulations aimed at multiple targets, to treat the entirety of different symptoms. 

Tietze L. F., Modi A. Multicomponent Domino Reactions for the Synthesis of Biologically Active Natural Products and Drugs Med. Res. Rev. 2000 20 304-322 Keywords Diels-Alder reactions... 

Multicomponent reactions (MCRs) have been known to produce highly complex and diverse structures [76]. There is a considerable interest in the application of new multicomponent reactions to access biologically relevant molecules [77,78] and natural products [79]. A recent report has disclosed multicomponent Passerini and Ugi reactions to produce, rapid and efficiently, a library of redox-active selenium and tellurium compounds [80]. The compounds showed promising cytotoxicity against several cancer cell lines. 

Probably the best-studied communication behavior in ants is chemical communication, but other sensory modalities, such as mechanical cues, also play an important role in the formation of multicomponent signals in ant communication. Chemical releasers are produced in a variety of exocrine glands, and considerable progress has been made in chemically identifying many of these glandular secretions (for reviews see refs. 1 and 2). In this essay I will not emphasize, however, the natural product chemistry of ant pheromones, but rather concentrate on the proposition that communication in ant societies is often based on multicomponent signals, on nested levels of variation in chemical and other cues, which feature both anonymous and specific characteristics (3). 

NRPSs are responsible for the biosynthesis of a wide range of structurally diverse natural products. Included in this large family of small molecules are several examples of clinically important therapeutics. The basic enzymology of these systems represents a fascinating example of complex multicomponent... 

Also reactions that rapidly create more diversity are sought after. In recent years, more and more multicomponent reactions (MCRs) have been developed and combined with modern synthetic methods such as RCM or Pd couplings to provide rapid access to complex, natural product-like structures in solution. 

Pyridine and its partially or totally unsaturated derivatives such as tetrahydropy-ridines, DHPs, and piperidines are ubiquitous cores found in numerous natural product skeletons and in synthetic compounds of primary interest for synthetic chemistry, agrochemistry, or pharmacology. Among the various methodologies available for the synthesis of these compounds, multicomponent approaches have attracted much attention in the last few years. Most of these sequences are initiated by a Michael addition. 

Multicomponent Reactions in the Total Synthesis of Natural Products... 

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