• HOME
  • NEWS
  • EXPLORE
    • CAREER
      • Companies
      • Jobs
    • EVENTS
    • iGEM
      • News
      • Team
    • PHOTOS
    • VIDEO
    • WIKI
  • BLOG
  • COMMUNITY
    • FACEBOOK
    • INSTAGRAM
    • TWITTER
Sunday, June 15, 2025
BIOENGINEER.ORG
No Result
View All Result
  • Login
  • HOME
  • NEWS
  • EXPLORE
    • CAREER
      • Companies
      • Jobs
        • Lecturer
        • PhD Studentship
        • Postdoc
        • Research Assistant
    • EVENTS
    • iGEM
      • News
      • Team
    • PHOTOS
    • VIDEO
    • WIKI
  • BLOG
  • COMMUNITY
    • FACEBOOK
    • INSTAGRAM
    • TWITTER
  • HOME
  • NEWS
  • EXPLORE
    • CAREER
      • Companies
      • Jobs
        • Lecturer
        • PhD Studentship
        • Postdoc
        • Research Assistant
    • EVENTS
    • iGEM
      • News
      • Team
    • PHOTOS
    • VIDEO
    • WIKI
  • BLOG
  • COMMUNITY
    • FACEBOOK
    • INSTAGRAM
    • TWITTER
No Result
View All Result
Bioengineer.org
No Result
View All Result
Home NEWS Science News Cancer

A new approach to chemical synthesis

Bioengineer by Bioengineer
June 7, 2016
in Cancer
Reading Time: 3 mins read
0
ADVERTISEMENT
Share on FacebookShare on TwitterShare on LinkedinShare on RedditShare on Telegram

A research team led by MIT chemistry professor Mohammad Movassaghi has developed a strategy for synthesizing a group of compounds called communesins, which occur naturally in some fungi. Researchers may now be able to further investigate the compounds’ cancer-fighting abilities. Pictured is an image of penicillium fungus.

MIT chemists have devised a new way to synthesize a complex molecular structure that is shared by a group of fungal compounds with potential as anticancer agents. Known as communesins, these compounds have shown particular promise against leukemia cells but may be able to kill other cancer cells as well.

The new synthesis strategy, described in the Journal of the American Chemical Society, should enable researchers to generate large enough quantities of these compounds to run more tests of their anticancer activity. It should also allow scientists to produce designed variants of the naturally occurring communesins, which may be even more potent.

“This is just the foundation,” says Mohammad Movassaghi, an MIT professor of chemistry and the paper’s senior author. “We’ve laid the foundation for implementation of this strategy to access other variations, both natural and nonnatural.”

Communesins are a unique family of polycyclic and complex naturally occurring alkaloids. One of the major hurdles to synthesizing communesins in the lab using this new strategy is a chemical reaction in which two large, bulky molecules must be joined together in a step known as heterodimerization.

Movassaghi’s lab, which has been working on this type of synthesis for several years, was inspired by the way related compounds are produced in nature. The details of the natural synthesis are not fully known, but it is believed that it also involves a heterodimerization step. In fungi, there is evidence that an enzyme catalyzes this reaction.

Without an enzyme, the heterodimerization required to produce communesins is difficult to carry out because it requires forming a bond between two carbon atoms that are each already bonded to four other atoms, some of which have additional bulky groups attached to them. This makes it challenging to bring the two molecules close enough for them to fuse together.

To overcome this, Movassaghi’s lab developed an approach in which they transform the two carbon atoms into carbon radicals (carbon atoms with one unpaired electron). To create these radicals, the researchers first attach each of the targeted carbon atoms to a nitrogen atom, and these two nitrogen atoms bind to each other.

When the researchers shine certain wavelengths of light on the reactants, it causes the two atoms of nitrogen to break away as nitrogen gas, leaving behind two very reactive carbon radicals that join together almost immediately.

“If you break the carbon-nitrogen bond, the intermediate has a very short lifetime. We predict it to be roughly on the order of picoseconds,” Movassaghi says. “Dinitrogen pops out and now you have two radicals in very close proximity.”

Once the heterodimer is formed, three more chemical steps are required, including the transfer of a nitrogen-containing chemical group from one carbon atom to another.

“Just heterodimerizing is only half the battle,” Movassaghi says. “There were two major challenges in this successful synthesis. One was how do you get to a heterodimer, and once you fuse the two halves together, how do you guide the rearrangement to match the structure that you find in nature?”

In this study, the MIT team prepared a key precursor that was converted to the compound known as communesin F in only five steps. The critical heterodimer rearrangement step proceeded to yield 82 percent of the desired heptacyclic communesin structure.

Scott Miller, a professor of chemistry at Yale University, describes the new approach as “a masterful synthesis.”

“The strategy is incredibly ambitious and reflects a sophisticated assessment of the plausible biosynthetic precursor. This is really very clever, since these pathways are typically not known at the level of complete understanding, so outstanding intuition and creativity are required,” says Miller, who was not involved in the research.

This strategy can also be used to produce related communesins, including variants not found in nature.

“Nature has likely evolved these compounds for chemical defense or signaling between different organisms, but if we’re thinking about their potential for treatment of human disease, we may need to access nonnatural derivatives,” Movassaghi says. “Our ability to go in with pinpoint accuracy and make structural variations to these complex alkaloids is going to be helpful in enabling the thorough evaluation of these compounds and related derivatives.”

The study was conducted by graduate student Matthew Pompeo and former postdocs Stephen Lathrop and Wen-Tau Chang. The project was funded by the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation.

Story Source:

The above post is reprinted from materials provided by MIT NEWS

The post A new approach to chemical synthesis appeared first on Scienmag.

Share12Tweet8Share2ShareShareShare2

Related Posts

Cancer

HPV Identified as Key Driver in Tumor Formation of Rare Nasal Cancers

June 11, 2025
Duan Family Building at Mayo Clinic in Florida

Mayo Clinic Advances Availability of Heavy Particle Therapy for Aggressive Cancers in the Western Hemisphere

June 11, 2025

New Program Empowers Cancer Survivors to Reenter the Workforce with Confidence

June 11, 2025

Study Reveals How American College of Surgeons Accreditation Enhances Quality Improvement

June 11, 2025
Please login to join discussion

POPULAR NEWS

  • Green brake lights in the front could reduce accidents

    Study from TU Graz Reveals Front Brake Lights Could Drastically Diminish Road Accident Rates

    158 shares
    Share 63 Tweet 40
  • New Study Uncovers Unexpected Side Effects of High-Dose Radiation Therapy

    75 shares
    Share 30 Tweet 19
  • Pancreatic Cancer Vaccines Eradicate Disease in Preclinical Studies

    69 shares
    Share 28 Tweet 17
  • How Scientists Unraveled the Mystery Behind the Gigantic Size of Extinct Ground Sloths—and What Led to Their Demise

    65 shares
    Share 26 Tweet 16

About

We bring you the latest biotechnology news from best research centers and universities around the world. Check our website.

Follow us

Recent News

Magnetic Soft Millirobot Enables Simultaneous Locomotion, Sensing

Urban Form Shapes Compound Natural Risk: US Study

Perivascular Fluid Diffusivity Predicts Early Parkinson’s Decline

  • Contact Us

Bioengineer.org © Copyright 2023 All Rights Reserved.

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In
No Result
View All Result
  • Homepages
    • Home Page 1
    • Home Page 2
  • News
  • National
  • Business
  • Health
  • Lifestyle
  • Science

Bioengineer.org © Copyright 2023 All Rights Reserved.