French scientists have synthesised borono-analogues of nucleotides that form di-nucleotides through a borate ester bond rather than the phosphate linkage found in their natural counterparts. This finding opens the possibility of boron playing a role in pre-biotic chemistry or could form the basis of an artificial genetic code, claim the authors.
The team led by Jean-Jacques Vasseur and Michael Smietana at University of Montpellier 2, France, synthesised the borono-nucleotides from the respective 5’-aldehydic nucleoside through a homologation/reduction sequence. The boron was added by borylation or cross-metathesis. Replacing the phosphate linkages with boron allows the reversible non-enzymatic assembly of these compounds with ribonucleotide partners forming a new reversible linkage between two nucleotides...
Voir en ligne : http://www.rsc.org/Publishing/Journ...