Slaframine type alkaloids

Other natural indolizidine alkaloids comprise the fungi indolizidines (slaframine type alkaloids), Fig. (18), polyhydroxylated indolizidines (usually isolated from the plant genera Eleocarpus, Astragalus and Iponuga), and marine type indolizidines. 

Pyrrolizidines compounds have been produced in connection with syntheses of other types of natural products. For example, Gensler and Hu prepared the dioxopyrrolizidine ester (46) as an intermediate in the synthesis of ( + )-slaframine, an indolizidine alkaloid obtained from cultures of Rhizoctonia leguminicola. The pyrrolidone ester (47), prepared from l-glutamic acid [Eq. (14)], was optically active, but the cyclized product, formed in quantitative yield from 47, was completely racemized. The synthesis of 2-acetyl-1,3-dioxopyrrolizidine (48) was carried out by Kruger and Arndt to assist with their investigations on model compounds aimed toward the total synthesis of a-cyclopiazonic acid, the main toxic principle of Penicillium cyclopium The spectra of the product (48) obtained in 30% overall yield was typical of an intramolecularly H-bonded enolized )S-... 

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