Sulfur drugs

Although some efficacious drugs have been known for centuries, such as the antimalarial quinine first used in 1639, most important discoveries are of more recent origin. Smallpox vaccine was discovered around 1800, morphine in 1820, aspirin in 1894, and phenobarbital in 1912. But the discovery of the antibacterial activity of sulfur drugs in 1932 and penicillin in 1940 started the golden era of rapid expansion and discovery in the industry. Nearly all important drugs today have been discovered since 1940, some very recently. 

Thiadiazoles were first described in 1882 by Fischer and further developed by Busch and his coworkers. The advent of sulfur drugs and the later discovery of mesoionic compounds greatly accelerated the rate of progress in the field of thiadiazoles. Thiadiazoles carrying mercapto, hydroxy and amino substituents can exist in many tautomeric forms and this property is being intensively studied using modern instrumental methods. 

D. R. Boyd, C. T. Walsh, and Y-C. J. Chen, S-oxygenases II—Chirality of sulfoxidation reactions. Sulfur Drugs and Related Organic Chemicals Chemistry, Biochemistry, and Toxiccdogy, Vol. 2 (L. A. Damani, ed.), Wiley, New York, 1989. 

Pyrimethamine and trimethoprim are inhibitors of both bacterial and protozoal dihydrofolate reductase (DHFR) enzymes but do not affect the mammalian enzyme. Further specificity is achieved by the use of PABA antagonists, since they are competitive inhibitors of the protozoal dihydropteroate (DHP) synthase reaction, which condenses PABA with hydroxymethyldihydropteridine to form DHP, an intermediate in the tetrahydrofolate (THF) biosynthetic pathway. Protozoa synthesize THF de novo whereas humans require dietary folate. For this reason sulfur drugs are selective and virtually non-toxic to humans. 

The isosteric relationship of benzene and thiophene has often led medicinal chemists to substitute the sulfur containing heterocycle for benzene drugs in biologically active molecules. That this relationship has some foundation in fact is attested by the observation that the resulting analogs often possess full biologic activity. Alkylation of the diamine, 71 (obtained from aniline and the chloroethylamine), with 2-chloromethylthiophene affords the antihistamine methaphenylene (72) The correspond-... 

With 112 structurally characterized complexes, sulfur-based electrons are by far the most commonly encountered. This is attributed to its importance in antithyroid drugs, as described above. The majority of these complexes... 

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