Pyrimidine effects

Several synthetic pyrimidines and purines are useful drugs Acyclovir was the first effective antiviral compound and is used to treat herpes infections 6 Mercaptopunne is one of the drugs used to treat childhood leukemia which has become a very treatable form of cancer with a cure rate approaching 80%... 

The mode of action has been a subject for research for a number of years. While it was originally thought that maleic hydrazide replaced uracil in the RNA sequence, it has been deterrnined that the molecule may be a pyrimidine or purine analogue and therefore base-pair formation is possible with uracil and thymine and there exists the probabiHty of base-pair formation with adenine however, if maleic hydrazide occurs in an in vivo system as the diketo species, then there remains the possibiHty of base-pairing with guanine (50). Whatever the mechanism, it is apparent that the inhibitory effects are the result of a shutdown of the de novo synthesis of protein. 

Alkylation of pyrimidin-2(or 4)-amine on a ring-nitrogen gives an imine, e.g. (8), of quite high basic strength (pjSTa 10.7) because its cation, e.g. (13 R = Me), has typical and effective resonance stabilization indeed, methylation of pyrimidine-2,4-diamine gives a still stronger base (pjSTa> 13) due to an even more resonance-stabilized cation (14). 

Much of the reactivity shown by the ring atoms and substituents of pyrimidine is akin to that of the corresponding parts of 1,3-dinitrobenzene and 3-nitropyridine. This arises from the quantitatively similar electron-withdrawing effects of doubly-bound ring nitrogen atoms and of nitro groups in reducing sharply the aromaticity of the cyclic system. 

Primary synthesis has limited application in making pyrimidine-carboxylic acids or even their esters. However, some pyrimidine-4(and 5)-carboxylic acids can be effectively so made. For example, bromomucic acid (785) reacts as an aidehydo ketone with S-methyl-thiourea to give 5-bromo-2-methylthiopyrimidine-4-carboxylic acid (786) directly (53JCS3129) while the Whitehead synthesis (Section 2.13.3.1.2<7) can give, for instance, 3-methylcytosine-5-carboxylic acid (787) (55MI21300). 

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