Unified Approach to Furan Natural Products via Phosphine-Palladium Catalysis

Polyalkyl furans are widespread in nature, often performing important biological roles. Despite a plethora of methods for the synthesis of tetrasubstituted furans, the construction of tetraalkyl furans remains non-trivial. The prevalence of alkyl groups in bioactive furan natural products, combined with the desirable bioactivities of tetraalkyl furans, calls for a general synthetic protocol for polyalkyl furans. This paper describes a Michael-Heck approach, using sequential phosphine-palladium catalysis, for the preparation of various polyalkyl furans from readily available precursors. The versatility of this method is illustrated by the total syntheses of nine distinct polyalkylated furan natural products belonging to different classes, namely the furanoterpenes rosefuran, sesquirosefuran, and mikanifuran; the marine natural products plakorsins A, B, and D and plakorsin D methyl ester; and the furan fatty acids 3D5 and hydromumiamicin.

Gold(I)-catalysed synthesis of a furan analogue of thiamine pyrophosphate

An analogue of thiamine having a furan ring in place of the thiazolium ring has been synthesised by a short and efficient route, involving gold(I)-catalysed cyclisation of an alkynyl alcohol to form the furan ring. The furan analogue of thiamine diphosphate (ThDP) was also made and tested for binding to and inhibition of pyruvate decarboxylase (PDC) from Zymomonas mobilis (overexpressed in E. coli with a N-terminal His-tag). It is a very strong inhibitor, with a K i value of 32.5 pM. It was also shown that the furan analogue of thiamine can be functionalised at the C-2 position, which will allow access to mimics of reaction intermediates of various ThDP-dependent enzymes.