The influence of arylthiols on cysteine-free ligation, i.e. the reaction between an alkyl thioester and a primary amine forming an amide bond, was studied in a polar aprotic solvent. We reacted the ethylthioester of hippuric acid with cyclohexylamine in the absence or presence of various quantities of thiophenol (PhSH) in a slurry of disodium hydrogen phosphate in dry DMF. Quantitative conversions into the resulting amide were observed within a few hours in the presence of equimolar amounts of thiophenol. Ab initio calculations showed that the reaction mechanism in DMF is similar to the well-known aqueous reaction mechanism. The energy barrier of the catalyzed amidation reaction is approximately 40 kJ mol−1 lower than the non-catalyzed amidation reaction. At least partially this can be explained by a hydrogen bond from the amine to the π-electrons of the thiophenol, stabilizing the transition state in the aromatic thioester amidation reaction. Under similar conditions, cysteine-free ligation was achieved by coupling a fully side-chain protected 15 amino acid phosphopeptide thioester to the free N-terminal of a side-chain protected 9 amino acid peptide producing the corresponding 24 amino acid phosphopeptide.
在极性非质子溶剂中研究了芳
硫醇对无半胱
氨酸连接(即烷基
硫酯和
伯胺之间形成酰胺键的反应)的影响。我们在存在或不存在不同量的
苯硫酚 (PhSH) 的情况下,在
磷酸氢二
钠在干燥
DMF 中的浆液中,使
马尿酸乙
硫酯与
环己胺反应。在等摩尔量的
苯硫酚存在下,在几个小时内观察到定量转化为所得酰胺。从头计算表明,
DMF 中的反应机理与众所周知的
水溶液反应机理相似。催化酰胺化反应的能垒比非催化酰胺化反应低约40 kJ mol−1。这至少部分可以通过从胺到
苯硫酚的π电子的氢键来解释,从而稳定了芳香族
硫酯酰胺化反应中的过渡态。在类似条件下,通过将完全侧链保护的 15 个
氨基酸磷酸肽
硫酯偶联到侧链保护的 9 个
氨基酸肽的游离 N 端,产生相应的 24 个
氨基酸磷酸肽,实现无半胱
氨酸连接。