Nucleic acids, nucleosides and nucleotides

6-Mercaptopurine is used in the treatment of leukemia and other cancers, Acyclovir is an antiviral agent used in the treatment of Herpes infections, and DDI is used in the treatment of AIDS. 

Nucleic acids are high-molecular-weight, mixed polymers of mononucleotides, in which chains are formed by monophosphate links between the 5 -position of one nucleoside and the 3 -position of the next. The backbone of the chain is thus composed of alternating phosphates and sugars, to which purine and pyrimidine bases are attached at regular intervals. The polymer is known as ribonucleic acid (RNA) when the sugar is ribose, and deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) when the sugar is 2-deoxyribose. 

DNA contains two purine bases, guanine and adenine, and two pyrimidine bases, cytosine and thymine. In RNA, thymine is replaced by uracil and in another form, t-RNA, other bases including small amounts of N-alkylated derivatives are present. 

Purine is a weak base, p/iT 2.5. C NMR studies suggest that all three protonat-ed forms are present in solution but the predominant cation is formed by N-l-protonation. In strong acid solution a dication is formed by protonation at N-1 and on the five-membered ring.  

The presence of oxygen functions does not seem to affect purine basicity to 

The only two effective hydrogen bonding pairings are adenine/thymine (AT) and guanine/cytosine (GC) 

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See also Nucleic Acids, Nucleoside and Nucleotide Naming, Phosphodiester Bonds, RNA, Proteins... 

Nucleic acids, nucleosides, and nucleotides Linscheid 1983 Budzikiewicz 1985 McCloskey 1986 Grotjahn 1986 Crain 1990. 

Phenylglyoxal and alkoxyphenylglyoxals react selectively with the guanine moiety of nucleosides and nucleotides in phosphate buffer (pH 7.0) at 37°C for 5-7 min to give the corresponding fluorescent derivatives [12-15], as shown in Figure 6. Other nucleic acid bases and nucleotides (e.g., adenine, cytosine, uracil, thymine, AMP, CMP) do not produce derivatives under such mild reaction conditions. The fluorescent derivative emits chemiluminescence on oxidation with di-methylformamide (DMF) and H202 at pH 8.0-12 [14, 15],... 

See Antibiotics, NUCLEOSIDES AND NUCLEOTIDES Chemotherapeutics, anticancer Nucleic acids. 

These sorbents may be used either for selective fixation of biological molecules, which must be isolated and purified, or for selective retention of contaminants. Selective fixation of biopolymers may be easily attained by regulation of eluent polarity on the basis of reversed-phase chromatography methods. Effective isolation of different nucleic acids (RNA, DNA-plasmid) was carried out [115, 116]. Adsorption of nucleosides, nucleotides, tRN A and DNA was investigated. It was shown that nucleosides and nucleotides were reversibly adsorbed on... 

A wide variety of bases, nucleosides and nucleotides have been separated using porous layer bead ion exchangers. A representative chromatogram of the separation of ribonucleoside mono-phosphoric acids from the work of Smukler ( ) is shown in Figure 4. Recently, ion exchangers chemically bonded to small particle diameter (> 10 ym) silica have been successfully applied to the separation of nucleic acid constitutents (37). The rapid separations using such supports undoubtedly mean that they will find increasing use in the future. 

A. Mononucleotides.—A new journal has appeared in the past year consisting of abstracts of papers published in the nucleotide and nucleic acid fields. The use of nucleosides and nucleotides as potential therapeutic agents has been reviewed. Nucleotides which have been prepared recently using conventional methods of phosphorylation include those derived from 6-methylthiopurine ribonucleoside (la), 5-methylsulphonyluridine (lb), l-(jS-D-ribofuranosyl)-2-pyrimidone (Ic), 3-(jS-D-ribofuranosyl)-4-pyrimidone (Id), and various thionucleosides. - O-Phosphorylated 3 -amino-3 -deoxythymidine (2a) and 5 -amino-5 -deoxythymidine (2b)... 

The actual building blocks for the nucleic acids are the nucleotides, which are formed in an esterification reaction between nucleosides and phosphate three OH functions of ribose, and two of deoxyribose, can undergo esterification ... 

Figure 4. Reaction Mechanism for N-Acetoxy Arylamines (V). Ac, acetyl RSCH3 methionine RNH2, N2-guanine-nucleosides, -nucleotides, or -nucleic acids RCH, C8-guanine-nucleo-sides, -nucleotides, or -nucleic acids. Pathways and heterolytic cleavages a and b are discussed in the text. Dashed arrows indicate proposed pathways.

Tipson devoted most of his years in Levene s laboratory accomplishing seminal work on the components of nucleic acids. To determine the ring forms of the ribose component of the ribonucleosides he applied Haworth s methylation technique and established the furanoid structure for the sugar in adenosine, guanosine, uridine, and thymidine. He showed that formation of a monotrityl ether is not a reliable proof for the presence of a primary alcohol group in a nucleoside, whereas a tosyl ester that is readily displaced by iodide affords clear evidence that the ester is at the 5-position of the pentofuranose. Acetonation of ribonucleosides was shown to give the 2, 3 -C -isopropyl-idene derivatives, which were to become extensively used in nucleoside and nucleotide chemistry, and were utilized by Tipson in the first chemical preparation of a ribonucleotide, inosinic acid. 

The chemistry of nucleic acid analogs has received much attention in recent years, and a series of nucleic acid models has been designed and widely prepared, in order to estimate and utilize their functionalities in relation to the specific basepairing properties ( J., i, ). These monomers and polymers, particularly those containing purines, pyrimidines, nucleosides, and nucleotides, are not only of interest to the field of heterocyclic organic chemistry, but also to that of biomimetic macro-molecular chemistry as synthetic analogs of the nucleic acids. 

Potentially tautomeric pyrimidines and purines are /V-alkylated under two-phase conditions, using tetra-n-butylammonium bromide or Aliquat as the catalyst [75-77], Alkylation of, for example, uracil, thiamine, and cytosine yield the 1-mono-and 1,3-dialkylated derivatives [77-81]. Theobromine and other xanthines are alkylated at N1 and/or at N3, but adenine is preferentially alkylated at N9 (70-80%), with smaller amounts of the N3-alkylated derivative (20-25%), under the basic two-phase conditions [76]. These observations should be compared with the preferential alkylation at N3 under neutral conditions. The procedure is of importance in the derivatization of nucleic acids and it has been developed for the /V-alkylation of nucleosides and nucleotides using haloalkanes or trialkyl phosphates in the presence of tetra-n-butylammonium fluoride [80], Under analogous conditions, pyrimidine nucleosides are O-acylated [79]. The catalysed alkylation reactions have been extended to the glycosidation of pyrrolo[2,3-r/]pyrimidines, pyrrolo[3,2-c]pyridines, and pyrazolo[3,4-r/]pyrimidines (e.g. Scheme 5.20) [e.g. 82-88] as a route to potentially biologically active azapurine analogues. 

The terminology nucleotide or nucleoside immediately directs our thoughts towards nucleic acids. Remarkably, nucleosides and nucleotides play other roles in biochemical reactions that are no less important than their function as part of nucleic acids. We also encounter more stmctural diversity. It is rare that the chemical and biochemical reactivities of these derivatives relate specihcally to the base plus sugar part of the structure, and usually reside elsewhere in the molecule. Almost certainly, it is this base plus sugar part of the structure that provides a recognition... 

Bases, Nucleosides, and Nucleotides. The relationship of these components of a nucleic acid or polynucleotide is shown in Chart 10. The numbering of the pyrimidine (uracil) and the purine (adenine) shown is the IUPAC nomenclature used by Chemical Abstracts, and... 

The obvious similarity between the purine bases of DNA and pteridines, especially between guanosine and pterins, has encouraged extensive studies of the synthesis and properties of pteridine-containing nucleoside and nucleotides. Synthetic methods have naturally built upon established methods of nucleic acid synthesis. The primary property of use in applications of these compounds to DNA chemistry is fluorescence, which is very much greater for pteridines than for purines. 

Nucleic-acid-related molecules (nucleotides, nucleosides, purines, pyrimidines) may also be used as dmgs themselves (and not only as dmg receptors). Once again, as discussed in chapters 7 and 9, this is most relevant in the areas of cancer and infectious disease, with purine/pyrimidine analogs being exploited as antimetabolites. 5-Fluorouracil is a well-described antineoplastic agent. Analogously, 5-fluorocytosine is used as an antifungal... 

Cytosine, thymine, and uracil are pyrimidines along with adenine and guanine they account for the five nucleic acid bases. Pyrimidines are heterocyclic single-ringed compounds based on the structure of pyrimidine. Cytosine, thymine, and uracil, like adenine and guanine, form nucleosides and nucleotides in RNA and DNA. When the bases combine with ribose, a ribo-nucleoside forms and when it attaches to deoxyribose, a deoxyribosenucleoside is formed. Names of the nucleoside are summarized in Table 29.1. These in turn combine with phospho-ryl groups, in a process called phosphorylation, to form their respective nucleotides that form nucleic acids. The nucleotides can be tri, di, and mono phosphate nucleotides similar to the way in which adenine forms ATP, ADP, and AMP. 

The purines and pyrimidines are relatively stable compounds with considerable aromatic character. Nevertheless, they react with many different reagents and, under some relatively mild conditions, can be completely degraded to smaller molecules. The chemistry of these reactions is complex and is made more so by the fact that a reaction at one site on the ring may enhance the reactivity at other sites. The reactions of nucleic acids are largely the same as those of the individual nucleosides or nucleotides, the rates of reaction are often influenced by the position in the polynucleotide chain and by whether the nucleic acid is single or double stranded. The reactions of nucleosides and nucleotides are best understood in terms of the electronic properties of the various positions in the bases.26 33 Most of the chemical reactions are nucleophilic addition or displacement reactions of types that are discussed in Chapters 12 and 13. 

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