Vibrational Stark effect spectroscopy was used to measure electrostatic fields in the hydrophobic region of the active site of human aldose reductase (hALR2). A new hALR2 inhibitor was designed and synthesized that contains a nitrile probe with a Stark tuning rate of 0.77 cm-1/(MV/cm). Mutations to amino acid residues in the vicinity of the nitrile functional group were selected based on electr...

An efficient protocol for the synthesis of a range of 1,2-benzisoxazoles using an improved 1,3-dipolar cycloaddition of nitrile oxides and benzyne is described. Key to the procedure is the in situ generation of the reactive nitrile oxide and benzyne reactants simultaneously.

The mechanism of hydrolysis of the nitrile (N-acetyl-phenylalanyl-2-amino-propionitrile, I) catalyzed by Gln19Glu mutant of papain has been studied by nanosecond molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. MD simulations of the complex of mutant enzyme with I and of mutant enzyme covalently attached to both neutral (II) and protonated (III) thioimidate intermediates were performed. An MD simulation wi...

Nitrile compounds are intermediates in the synthesis of pharmaceuticals such as atorvastatin. We have developed a chromogenic reagent to screen for nitrilase activity as an alternative to Nessler's reagent. It produces a semi-quantifiable blue colour and hydrolysis of 38 nitrile substrates by 23 nitrilases as cell-free extracts has been shown.

The title compound, [IrCl(C12H8NO)2{(CH3)2SO}]·H3CCN or [IrCl(fppy)2(DMSO)]·H3CCN [where fppy is 4-(pyridin-2-yl)benzaldehyde and DMSO is dimethyl sulfoxide], is a mononuclear iridium(III) complex including two fppy ligands, a sulfur-coordinating DMSO ligand, and one terminal chloride ligand that define a distorted octa-hedral coordination sphere. The complex crystallizes from 1:1 DMSO-aceto-ni...

The title compound, C(37)H(26)N(2)O(2), was synthesized from 1,1'-methyl-enedinaphthalen-2-ol and 3-(bromo-methyl)-benzo-nitrile. The two naphthyl systems are almost perpendicular to each other [dihedral angle 83.3 (9)°] and the two cyano-benz-yloxy rings approximately parallel to each other [dihedral angle 15.5 (2)°].

The geometric and electronic structure of the active site of the non-heme iron enzyme nitrile hydratase (NHase) is studied using sulfur K-edge XAS and DFT calculations. Using thiolate (RS(-))-, sulfenate (RSO(-))-, and sulfinate (RSO(2)(-))-ligated model complexes to provide benchmark spectral parameters, the results show that the S K-edge XAS is sensitive to the oxidation state of S-containing...

Crystallization-induced diastereoselective transformation (CIDT) of an α-methyl nitrile completes an entirely non-chromatographic synthesis of the halichondrin B C14-C26 stereochemical array. The requisite α-methyl nitrile substrate is derived from D-quinic acid through a series of substrate-controlled stereoselective reactions via a number of crystalline intermediates that benefit from a rigid...

In the title compound, C5HN7, the nitrile and azido substituents are close to being coplanar with the central ring. Mol-ecules in the crystal are linked via an N-H⋯N hydrogen bond to a nitrile acceptor, forming a chain extending along the c-axis direction.

An α-chiral nitrile carbanion generated by deprotonation of enantioenriched O-carbamoyl cyanohydrin was trapped in situ with ethyl cyanoformate to give the corresponding ester derivative in 92% yield and 90 : 10 er, providing the first example of trapping of an α-chiral acyclic nitrile carbanion that has been considered to be very configurationally labile.