Conservation and sustainable use of the medicinal Leguminosae plants from Angola.

Leguminosae is an economically important family that contains a large number of medicinal plants, many of which are widely used in African traditional medicine. Angola holds a great socio-cultural diversity and is one of the richest floristic regions of the world, with over 900 native Leguminosae species. This study is the first to assess the medicinal uses of the legumes in Angola and provides new data to promote the conservation and the sustainable use of these unique resources.

Galloyl Carbohydrates with Antiangiogenic Activity Mediated by Capillary Morphogenesis Gene 2 (CMG2) Protein Binding.

We previously showed that a small molecule of natural origin, 1,2,3,4,6-penta- O-galloyl-β-d-glucopyranose (PGG), binds to capillary morphogenesis gene 2 (CMG2) with a submicromolar IC and also has antiangiogenic activity in vitro and in vivo. In this work, we synthetized derivatives of PGG with different sugar cores and phenolic substituents and tested these as angiogenesis inhibitors. In a high-throughput Förster resonant energy transfer-based binding assay, we found that one of our synthetic analogues (1,2,3,4,6-penta- O-galloyl-β-d-mannopyranose (PGM)), with mannose as central core and galloyl substituents, exhibit higher (up to 10×) affinity for CMG2 than the natural glucose prototype PGG and proved to be a potent angiogenesis inhibitor.

Anti-HIV-1 activity of a tripodal receptor that recognizes mannose oligomers.

The glycoprotein gp120 of the HIV-1 viral envelope has a high content in mannose residues, particularly α-1,2-mannose oligomers. Compounds that interact with these high-mannose type glycans may disturb the interaction between gp120 and its (co)receptors and are considered potential anti-HIV agents. Previously, we demonstrated that a tripodal receptor (1), with a central scaffold of 1,3,5-triethylbenzene substituted with three 2,3,4-trihydroxybenzoyl groups, selectively recognizes α-1,2-mannose polysaccharides.

Linear and branched alkyl-esters and amides of gallic acid and other (mono-, di- and tri-) hydroxy benzoyl derivatives as promising anti-HCV inhibitors.

Linear and branched compounds that contain two, three or five units of galloyl (3,4,5-trihydroxybenzoyl) or its isomer 2,3,4-trihydroxybenzoyl, as well as other mono- or dihydroxybenzoyl moieties have been synthesized. These molecules have been evaluated for their in vitro inhibitory effects against a wide panel of viruses showing preferential activity against HIV and HCV. Our structure-activity relationship studies demonstrated that the 2,3,4-trihydroxybenzoyl moiety provides better antiviral activities than the galloyl (3,4,5-trihydroxybenzoyl) moiety that is present in natural green tea catechins.

Importance of the polarity of the glycosaminoglycan chain on the interaction with FGF-1.

Heparin-like saccharides play an essential role in binding to the fibroblast growth factor (FGF)-1 and to their membrane receptors fibroblast growth factor receptor forming a ternary complex that is responsible of the internalization of the signal, via the dimerization of the intracellular regions of the receptor. In this study, we report the binding affinities between five synthetic hexasaccharides with human FGF-1 obtained by surface plasmon resonance experiments, and compare with the induced mitogenic activity previously obtained. These five oligosaccharides differ in sulfation pattern and in sequence.

3D structure of a heparin mimetic analogue of a FGF-1 activator. A NMR and molecular modelling study.

The motional behaviour of heparin oligosaccharides in solution is best described as a top rotor having two perpendicular rotation axes. This prevents an accurate extraction of interprotonic distances by NOESY/ROESY based methods. In this paper, we describe the solution structure of the hexasaccharide 1 calculated from high exactitude distance data obtained from off-resonance ROESY combined with a long MD simulation of 500 ns.

One-pot synthesis of polycyclic nucleosides with unusual molecular skeletons.

An alpha hydroxy pyrrolidine tricyclic nucleoside 3 and its spontaneous reaction with acetone is described. In this transformation highly functionalized polycyclic nucleosides with rather unusual molecular skeletons are formed in a complete regio- and stereoselective way. The reaction involves the formation of three new bonds, two of them novel carbon-carbon bonds, in a one-pot way.