A.M.C. Bizerra et al. / Tetrahedron 67 (2011) 2858e2862
2861
Table 6
respectively. C. antarctica lipase A (CAL-A) was purchased from
Codexis (2.6 U/mg of solid). All other reagents were purchased from
different commercial sources and used without further purifica-
tion. Solvents were distilled over an adequate desiccant under ni-
trogen. Flash chromatographies were performed using silica gel 60
(230e240 mesh).
Lipase-mediated hydrolysis of 4e with CAL-B in a buffer/organic solvent system
(80:20 v vꢁ1
) at different temperatures and 250 rpm at 0.15 M concentration
(t¼24 h)
Entry
T (ꢀC)
Solvent
1a (%)
4ea (%)
5ea (%)
1
2
3
4
5
6
20
30
20
30
20
30
1,4-Dioxane
1,4-Dioxane
MeCN
MeCN
THF
23
18
14
8
12
16
63
73
8
18
21
54
14
9
78
74
67
30
4.2. General procedure for the esterification reaction of (L)-
chloramphenicol at 0.25 M substrate concentration using
vinyl palmitate
THF
a
Percentage of compounds determined by HPLC and 1H NMR.
To a suspension of (ꢁ)-chloramphenicol (1, 1 g, 3.1 mmol) and
CAL-B (1 g) in dry MeCN (12.5 mL) under nitrogen atmosphere,
vinyl palmitate (3a, 4.26 g, 15.0 mmol) was added, and the reaction
was shaken at 20 ꢀC and 250 rpm. Aliquots were regularly analysed
by HPLC and the reaction was stopped after complete consumption
of the starting material after 1 h. Finally the enzyme was filtered off
and washed with EtOAc (3ꢂ10 mL). The solvent was evaporated
under reduced pressure. The reaction crude was purified by flash
chromatography on silica gel (30% EtOAc/hexane) affording the
corresponding ester 2a (87% isolated yield). Characterizations of
monoester 2a and all novel compounds are given in the
Supplementary data file.
The hydrolyses of diacylated derivatives 4aed were then carried
out under the optimal conditions depicted in entry 3 of Table 6,
observing a correlation between the chain length of the ester moiety
and the enzymatic conversion (Fig. 2). Thus, when longer ester
moieties were employed, lower conversions were reached. While
the dipropionate compound 4d afforded 74% of 5d,17 didecanoate 4b
provided only a 10% of 5b, dilaurate 4c a 4% of 5c and dipalmitate 4a
did not react. This effect can be explained because bulkier diacylated
products could not correctly fit in the active site of the enzyme.
Acknowledgements
The authors thank to the Brazilian and Spanish agencies CAPES-
DGU (Process: 149/07), CNPq, FUNCAP, PRONEX, Ministerio de
ꢀ
Ciencia e Innovacion (MICINN, Project CTQ 2007-61126) for fel-
ꢀ
lowships and financial support. I.L. and V.G.-F. (Ramon y Cajal
program) thank MICINN for personal grants.
Supplementary data
Supplementary data associated with this article can be found in
MOL files and InChIKeys of the most important compounds de-
scribed in this article.
Fig. 2. Effect of the chain length in the CAL-B-catalysed hydrolysis of diacylated
chloramphenicol derivatives.
References and notes
3. Conclusions
1. (a) Danieli, B.; Riva, S. Pure Appl. Chem. 1994, 66, 2215e2218; (b) Ferrero, M.;
Gotor, V. Chem. Rev. 2000, 100, 4319e4347; (c) Riva, S. J. Mol. Catal. B: Enzym.
2002, 19e20, 43e54; (d) Stolz, T.; Gu, J.; Wilk, B.; Olsen, E. Tetrahedron Lett.
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Riva, S. Org. Biomol. Chem. 2010, 8, 5583e5590.
2. A nice example is the regioselective enzymatic acylation of rapamycin. See, for
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3. Rebstock, M. C.; Crooks, H. M., Jr.; Controulis, J.; Bartz, Q. R. J. Am. Chem. Soc.
1949, 71, 2458e2462.
In summary, we have successfully demonstrated the versatility
of lipases, especially CAL-B, applied to the regioselective production
of chloramphenicol esters, acylating or hydrolysing the primary
position in short reaction times. Industrial application of the
transesterification reaction has been considered showing the pos-
sibility to carry out the experiments at high substrate concentra-
tions (0.25 M) and recycling the enzyme for a large number of
cycles (up to 10), thus obtaining interesting compounds, such as the
palmitate derivative with excellent yields. Furthermore, mono-
acylated compounds on the secondary alcohol group, difficult to
achieve by conventional methodologies, were obtained with good
to moderate yields through biocatalysed regioselective hydrolytic
processes.
4. El-Wahed, M. G. A.; Refat, M. S.; El-Megharbel, S. M. J. Mol. Struct. 2008, 892,
402e413.
ꢀ
5. Gro
b
, F.; Lewis, E. A.; Piraee, M.; van Pee, K.-H.; Vining, L. C.; White, R. L. Bioorg.
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2463e2468; (b) Long, L. M.; Troutman, H. D. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 1949, 71,
2469e2475; (c) Veeresa, G.; Datta, A. Tetrahedron Lett. 1998, 39, 8503e8504; (d)
Daugs, E. D. Org. Process Res. Dev. 2000, 4, 301e304; (e) Bhaskar, G.; Kumar, V.
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J. C.; Gogoi, S.; Barua, N. C. Tetrahedron Lett. 2005, 46, 1743e1746; (g) Hajra, S.;
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4. Experimental section
4.1. General
7. (a) Shaw, W. V. J. Biol. Chem. 1967, 242, 687e693; (b) El-Kersh, T. A.; Plourde, J. R.
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34, 97e107.
Immobilised C. antarctica lipase type B (CAL-B, Novozym 435,
7300 PLU/g) was a gift from Novo Nordisk Co. Immobilised P.
cepacia lipases PSL-C Amano (1019 U/g) and PSL-C I (1638 U/g)
were acquired from Amano Pharmaceutical Co. and SigmaeAldrich,
10. The amount of enzyme employed with regards to the substrate (1:1 wwꢁ1) was
selected due to our previous experience in similar lipase-catalysed acylation