Synthesis of 'clickable' acylhomoserine lactone quorum sensing probes: unanticipated effects on mammalian cell activation.

Alkynyl- and azido-tagged 3-oxo-C(12)-acylhomoserine lactone probes have been synthesized to examine their potential utility as probes for discovering the mammalian protein target of the Pseudomonas aeruginosa autoinducer, 3-oxo-C(12)-acylhomoserine lactone. Although such substitutions are commonly believed to be quite conservative, from these studies, we have uncovered a drastic difference in activity between the alkynyl- and azido-modified compounds, and provide an example where such structural modification has proved to be much less than conservative.