Oxidation of Cholesterol by a Biomimetic Oxidant, Cetyltrimethylammonium Dichromate

Potential application of Micellar nanoreactor for electron transfer reactions mediated by a variety of oxidants: A review

Surfactant, either natural or synthetic, forms a different type of aggregates among which 'Micelle' is truly an important dynamic surfactant aggregate, having a different region to interact with several organic, inorganic, and biomolecules; therefore the practical use of micelle is rapidly growing day-to-day. Surfactant-micelle, looks like a reactor of nano-dimension, govern a variety of reactions in aqueous media extensively. Oxidation is one of the vital reaction, take a part in the course of several organic transformations which are not very easy to execute in water media alone due to the solubility problem. Moreover, in order to achieve a quick transformation overcoming several difficulties the utility of micellar media became an excellent innovation, that's why nowadays, the surfactant and its aggregates are a focus of interest to the researcher of synthetic field and thus its practical applicability has been tremendously cultivated over the few decades. It is, therefore, useful to introduce some basic concepts regarding the aggregation of surfactants. Subsequently, we emphasize the importance of micellar media on the kinetics of oxidation reactions mediated by several metal ions with a special emphasis on their catalytic role.

The balance between induction and inhibition of mevalonate pathway regulates cancer suppression by statins: A review of molecular mechanisms

Statins are widely used drugs for their role in decreasing cholesterol in hypercholesterolemic patients. Statins through inhibition of Hydroxy Methyl Glutaryl-CoA Reductase (HMGCR), the main enzyme of the cholesterol biosynthesis pathway, inhibit mevalonate pathway that provides isoprenoids for prenylation of different proteins such as Ras superfamily which has an essential role in cancer developing. Inhibition of the mevalonate/isoprenoid pathway is the cause of the cholesterol independent effects of statins or pleotropic effects. Depending on their penetrance into the extra-hepatic cells, statins have different effects on mevalonate/isoprenoid pathway. Lipophilic statins diffuse into all cells and hydrophilic ones use a variety of membrane transporters to gain access to cells other than hepatocytes. It has been suggested that the lower accessibility of statins for extra-hepatic tissues may result in the compensatory induction of mevalonate/isoprenoid pathway and so cancer developing. However, most of the population-based studies have demonstrated that statins have no effect on cancer developing, even decrease the risk of different types of cancer. In this review we focus on the cancer developing "potentials" and the anti-cancer "activities" of statins regarding the effects of statins on mevalonate/isoprenoid pathway in the liver and extra-hepatic tissues.

Recent advances in cholesterol chemistry

This review article presents advances in cholesterol chemistry since 2000. Various transformations (chemical, enzymatic, electrochemical, etc.) of cholesterol are presented. A special emphasis is given to cholesterol oxidation reactions, but also substitution of the 3β-hydroxyl group, addition to the C5-C6 double bond, C-H functionalization, and C-C bond forming reactions are discussed.

Oxidation of Alcohol by Lipopathic Cr(VI): A Mechanistic Study

The oxidation kinetics of various aliphatic primary and secondary alcohols having varied hydrocarbon chain length were studied using cetyltrimethylammonium dichromate (CTADC) in dichloromethane (DCM) in the presence of acetic acid and in the presence of a cationic surfactant. The rate of the reaction is highly sensitive to the change in [CTADC], [alcohol], [acid], [surfactant], polarity of the solvents, and reaction temperature. A Michaelis-Menten type kinetics was observed with respect to substrate. The chemical nature of the intermediate and the reaction mechanism were proposed on the basis of (i) observed rate constant dependencies on the reactants, that is, fractional order with respect to alcohol and acid and a negative order with respect to oxidant, (ii) high negative entropy change, (iii) inverse solvent kinetic isotope effect, k(H2O)/k(D2O) = 0.76, (iv) low primary kinetic isotope effect, kH/kD = 2.81, and (v) the k(obs) dependencies on solvent polarity parameters. The observed experimental data suggested the self-aggregation of CTADC giving rise to a reverse micellar system akin to an enzymatic environment, and the proposed mechanism involves the following: (i) formation of a complex between alcohol and the protonated dichromate in a rapid equilibrium, equilibrium constant K = 5.13 (+/-0.07) dm(3) mol(-1), and (ii) rate determining decomposition (k(2) = (7.6 +/- 0.7) x 10(-3) s(-1)) of the ester intermediate to the corresponding carbonyl compound. The effect of [surfactant] on the rate constant and the correlation of solvent parameters with the rate constants support the contribution of hydrophobic environment to the reaction mechanism.