| Summary: | beta-Turns in many biologically active peptides are important secondary structural elements which are critical for their biological activities. Hence, it is not surprising that beta-turn based pharmacophore design including beta-turn mimetics has become a central topic in medicinal chemistry in addition to alpha-helix or helical peptides. One of the advantages of such beta-turn mimetics is that they can better control torsion angles of the backbone of peptides and to some degree dihedral angles chi (X). These beta-turn mimicking scaffolds are designed to have a higher avidity for the acceptor by overcoming what otherwise is the inherent entropic cost paid for beta-turn formation upon binding to the acceptor. Among different synthetic strategies to bicyclic structures as beta-turn mimetics, consecutive formation of bicyclic structures using tandem acid-catalyzed N-acyliminium ion cyclization is attractive since this methodology was well established in the synthesis of natural product alkaloids. 1,3,6,8-Substituted tetrahydro-2H-pyrazino[1,2-a]pyrimidine-4,7-diones were designed and synthesized as internal beta-turn mimetics through an acid-catalyzed tandem acyliminium ion cyclization. Its development and synthesis are decribed in Chapter 2 to Chapter 4. Its application toward the development and synthesis of a small molecule ligand for melanocortin receptors is described in Chapter 5. In addition, the development of peptidomimetics for opioid receptors is explained in Chapter 6. On the other hand, a dicarba analogue having opioid receptor agonist, and dicarba analogues for MCRs were synthesized through solid phase synthesis including a ring closing metathesis reaction using Grubbs' catalyst (I) in Chapter 8.
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