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The natural products vinaxanthone and xanthofulvin promote regeneration in animal models of spinal cord injury and corneal transplant. However, inhibition of the initially described biological target of these compounds, semaphorin 3A, does not fully account for the recovery demonstrated in vivo following administration of the natural products. Through chemical synthesis substantial quantities of both natural products have been accessed with early reaction development paving the way for synthesizing both compounds. The success of a model system, first disclosed herein, translated to the syntheses of both natural products. Following from this we also report for the first time the discovery of a new target of the natural products, the succinate receptor 1 (SUCNR1). Both natural products function as positive allosteric modulators of SUCNR1. As the first known allosteric modulators of SUCNR1, the compounds represent powerful new tools to understand the pharmacology of SUCNR1 and its control of growth and cellular defense.

SummaryChiral building blocks are valuable intermediates in the syntheses of natural products and pharmaceuticals. A scalable chemoenzymatic route to chiral diketides has been developed that includes the general synthesis of α-substituted, β-ketoacyl N-acetylcysteamine thioesters followed by a biocatalytic cycle in which a glucose-fueled NADPH-regeneration system drives reductions catalyzed by isolated modular polyketide synthase (PKS) ketoreductases (KRs). To identify KRs that operate as active, stereospecific biocatalysts, 11 isolated KRs were incubated with 5 diketides and their products were analyzed by chiral chromatography. KRs that naturally reduce small polyketide intermediates were the most active and stereospecific toward the panel of diketides. Several biocatalytic reactions were scaled up to yield more than 100 mg of product. These syntheses demonstrate the ability of PKS enzymes to economically and greenly generate diverse chiral building blocks on a preparative scale.

To improve the synthesis and reactivity of phthaloyl peroxide derivatives a method has been developed using sodium percarbonate and phthaloyl chlorides. The reactions of the new phthaloyl peroxide derivatives with trans-stillbene as well as the improved reactivity of 3,4-dichlorophthaloyl peroxide with a variety of alkenes are reported.