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Herpesviruses are highly prevalent in the human population, and frequent reactivations occur throughout life. Despite antiviral drugs against herpetic infections, the increasing appearance of drug-resistant viral strains and their adverse effects prompt the research of novel antiherpetic drugs for treating lesions. Peptides obtained from natural sources have recently become of particular interest for antiviral therapy applications. In this work, we investigated the antiviral activity of the peptide A-3302-B, isolated from a marine bacterium, Micromonospora sp., strain MAG 9-7, against herpes simplex virus type 1, type 2, and human cytomegalovirus. Results showed that the peptide exerted a specific inhibitory activity against HSV-2 with an EC50 value of 14 μM. Specific antiviral assays were performed to investigate the mechanism of action of A-3302-B. We demonstrated that the peptide did not affect the expression of viral proteins, but it inhibited the late events of the HSV-2 replicative cycle. In detail, it reduced the cell-to-cell virus spread and the transmission of the extracellular free virus by preventing the egress of HSV-2 progeny from the infected cells. The dual antiviral and previously reported anti-inflammatory activities of A-3302-B, and its effect against an acyclovir-resistant HSV-2 strain are attractive features for developing a therapeutic to reduce the transmission of HSV-2 infections.

Here we reveal a simple generation of deuterium halide (DX) from common and inexpensive reagents readily available in a synthetic chemistry laboratory, i.e. prenyl-, allyl-, and propargyl halides, under mild conditions. We envisaged that in situ generation of an acid, deuterium halide, would be useful for acid-catalyzed reactions and could be employed for organocatalytic deuteration. The present work reports a metal-free method for deuterium labeling covering a broad range of substrate including phenolic compounds (i.e. flavonoids and stilbenes), indoles, pyrroles, carbonyl compounds, and steroids. This method was also applied for commonly used drugs such as loxoprofen, haloperidol, stanolone, progesterone, androstenedione, donepezil, ketorolac, adrenosterone, cortisone, pregnenolone, and dexamethasone. A gram-scale chromatography-free synthesis of some deuterated compounds is demonstrated in this work. This work provides a simple, clean and by-product-free, site-selective deuteration, and the deuterated products are obtained without chromatographic separation. When applying these initiators for other acid-catalyzed reactions, the deuterium isotope effects of DX may provide products which are different from those obtained from reactions using common acids. Although the mechanism of the spontaneous transformation of prenyl halides to acid is unclear, this overlooked chemistry may be useful for many reactions.