Pheromonally yours : The aphrodisiac pheromones of male Cabbage White butterflies were identified. The small butterfly uses the smaller molecule ferrulactone ( 1 ) to enhance its mating success, while the large butterfly uses the larger compound brassicalactone ( 2 ), which is a new natural product. Both compounds are active in combination with hexahydrofarnesylacetone and phytol.
High‐density peptide arrays with solid amino acid particles: Intermittent “freezing” of activated amino acid derivatives within solid particles allows a laser printer or a chip to spatially address these “postal packages”. Subsequent parallel coupling is started simply by melting a whole layer of 20 different amino acid particles, freeing the hitherto immobilized amino acids and resulting in the coupling of all 20 different amino acids to the support in a single coupling step.
Shedding light on the lamellarins : Structural determinants for potent cytotoxic activity toward various cancer cell lines were systematically investigated to establish SARs for the marine alkaloids in the lamellarin family. The C5?C6 double bond ensures not only the planarity of the D‐ring, but also proper alignment of the substituents on the E‐ring with their respective moieties of the target. The importance of the C7 OH group is also revealed for the first time.
The conformations of all stereoisomers of PMRI cyclotetrapeptide mimetics 1 – 8 are essentially determined by the predisposition of the diamine to stabilize β‐turns. The peptide mimetics can be regarded as 3D scaffolds for designing molecules with a predictable display of the pharmacophores. We used the models for testing novel RGD analogues as αvβ3‐integrin receptor antagonists.
