Summary

Organic synthesis is the tool for the preparation of small molecules with interesting biological and medicinal properties—new compounds with activity against diseases affecting humankind today such as cancer, metabolic disorders, neurodegenerative disorders or infectious diseases, as well as new syntheses of known drugs. New bioactive compounds are designed and synthesized to target key metabolic reactions in pathological processes as the first steps toward drug discovery. The crosstalk between synthetic and medicinal chemists enable a high impact of new synthetic methodologies in drug discovery. The aim is to highlight the role that organic synthesis plays in developing methods that may be exploited for finding lead compounds and drugs by the pharmaceutical industry.

Expand All
Entries
Topic Review
Dihydropyrrolo[1,2-a]Pyrazinones
Dihydropyrrolo[1,2-a]pyrazinone rings are a class of heterocycles present in a wide range of bioactive natural products and analogues thereof. As a direct result of their bioactivity, the synthesis of this privileged class of compounds has been extensively studied. This review provides an overview of these synthetic pathways.
  • 3.3K
  • 09 Jun 2021
Topic Review
Progress on Plant-Inspired Soft Robotics
Millions of years’ evolution has imparted life on earth with excellent environment adaptability. Of particular interest to scientists are some plants capable of macroscopically and reversibly altering their morphological and mechanical properties in response to external stimuli from the surrounding environment. These intriguing natural phenomena and underlying actuation mechanisms have provided important design guidance and principles for man-made soft robotic systems. Constructing bio-inspired soft robotic systems with effective actuation requires the efficient supply of mechanical energy generated from external inputs, such as temperature, light, and electricity. By combining bio-inspired designs with stimuli-responsive materials, various intelligent soft robotic systems that demonstrate promising and exciting results have been developed. As one of the building materials for soft robotics, hydrogels are gaining increasing attention owing to their advantageous properties, such as ultra-tunable modulus, high compliance, varying stimuli-responsiveness, good biocompatibility, and high transparency. In this review article, we summarize the recent progress on plant-inspired soft robotics assembled by stimuli-responsive hydrogels with a particular focus on their actuation mechanisms, fabrication, and application. Meanwhile, some critical challenges and problems associated with current hydrogel-based soft robotics are briefly introduced, and possible solutions are proposed. We expect that this review would provide elementary tutorial guidelines to audiences who are interested in the study on nature-inspired soft robotics, especially hydrogel-based intelligent soft robotic systems. 
  • 1.3K
  • 03 Jun 2021
Topic Review
Monoterpenes as Anticancer Therapeutic Agents
Terpenes—a diverse group of secondary metabolites—constitute the largest class of natural products abundant in almost every plant species.
  • 1.8K
  • 17 May 2021
Topic Review
Ring-Fused Benzimidazoles and Imidazobenzimidazoles
The entry covers the synthesis and biological activity of ring-fused benzimidazoles, imidazo[4,5-f]benzimidazoles and imidazo[5,4-f]benzimidazoles. Compounds are bioreductive antitumor agents when the fused benzene part is a quinone or iminoquinone. Reactions are categorized according to the cyclization reaction, and include oxidative cyclizations using the t-amino effect. Other cyclizations are onto the 1- and 2-positions of benzimidazoles using cross-dehydrogenative coupling and homolytic aromatic substitution. Many syntheses are transition metal mediated, but others are metal-free using thermal, electrochemical and photochemical conditions.
  • 1.9K
  • 11 May 2021
Topic Review
Multienzymatic Processes Involving Baeyer–Villiger Monooxygenases
Baeyer–Villiger monooxygenases (BVMOs) are flavin-dependent oxidative enzymes capable of catalyzing the insertion of an oxygen atom between a carbonylic Csp2 and the Csp3 at the alpha position, therefore transforming linear and cyclic ketones into esters and lactones. These enzymes are dependent on nicotinamides (NAD(P)H) for the flavin reduction and subsequent reaction with molecular oxygen. BVMOs can be included in cascade reactions, coupled to other redox enzymes, such as alcohol dehydrogenases (ADHs) or ene-reductases (EREDs), so that the direct conversion of alcohols or α,β-unsaturated carbonylic compounds to the corresponding esters can be achieved. 
  • 1.1K
  • 11 May 2021
Topic Review
Green Synthetic Approach
Green synthetic protocol refers to the development of processes for the sustainable production of chemicals and materials. For the synthesis of various biologically active compounds, energy-efficient and environmentally benign processes are applied, such as microwave irradiation technology, ultrasound-mediated synthesis, photo-catalysis (ultraviolet, visible and infrared irradiation), molecular sieving, grinding and milling techniques, etc. 
  • 3.2K
  • 01 Jul 2021
Topic Review
Solketal
Solketal (CAS 100–79–8) has low viscosity at room temperature (~11 cP) and freezing, boiling, and flash points of about −26 °C, 190 °C, and 80 °C, respectively. The density is 1.06 g/cm3 and the vapor pressure is 107.32 mmHg. It has low toxicity, slight odor, and it is non-irritant for humans; due to these characteristics and to the renewable origin, it is considered an environmentally friendly substance. It is completely miscible in water and in most organic compounds, which endows its solvent capacity.
  • 4.9K
  • 07 May 2021
Topic Review
Synthetic Applications of Aziridinium Ions
Aziridines are three-membered cyclic organic heterocyclic compounds with one nitrogen atom in the ring. 
  • 2.1K
  • 27 Apr 2021
Topic Review
Synthesis of Natural Disesquiterpenoids
Natural disesquiterpenoids represent a small group of secondary metabolites characterized by complex molecular scaffolds and interesting pharmacological profiles. The intriguing architectures and the interesting pharmacological profile of sesquiterpene dimers attracted the attention of synthetic chemists in the attempt to duplicate the efficiency and the selectivity of natural processes under laboratory conditions.
  • 1.0K
  • 24 Apr 2021
Topic Review
Reductive Aminations with Metal Catalysts
Recently, N-substituted anilines have been the object of increasing research interest in the field of organic chemistry due to their role as key intermediates for the synthesis of important compounds such as polymers, dyes, drugs, agrochemicals and pharmaceutical products. Among the various methods reported in literature for the formation of C–N bonds to access secondary anilines, the one-pot reductive amination of aldehydes with nitroarenes is the most interesting procedure, because it allows to obtain diverse N-substituted aryl amines by simple reduction of nitro compounds followed by condensation with aldehydes and subsequent reduction of the imine intermediates. These kinds of tandem reactions are generally catalyzed by transition metal-based catalysts, mainly potentially reusable metal nanoparticles. 
  • 3.8K
  • 21 Apr 2021
  • Page
  • of
  • 18
>>