As metal ions are present in the catalytic sites of several enzymes, attention has been focused on the synthesis and characterization of metal complexes able to act as biomimetic functional and structural models for these systems. In this study, a novel dinuclear NiII complex was synthesized, [Ni2(L2)(OAc)2(CH3CN)]BPh4 (2) (HL2=2-[N-(2-(pyridyl-2-yl)ethyl)(1-methylimidazol-2-yl)amin omethyl]-4-methyl-6-[N-(2-(imidazol-4-yl)ethyl)amino methyl]phenol), employing a new unsymmetrical dinucleating ligand containing N,O-donor groups as a model for hydrolases. Complex 2 was characterized by a variety of techniques including: elemental analysis, infrared and UV-vis spectroscopies, molar conductivity, electrochemistry, potentiometric titration, magnetochemistry, and single-crystal X-ray diffractometry. The structural and magnetochemical data of 2 allow us to consider this complex as a structural model for the active site of the ureases, as previously reported for [Ni2(L1)(OAc)2(H2O)]ClO4.H2O (1) (HL1=2-[N-bis-(2-pyridylmethyl)aminomethyl]-4-methyl-6-[N-(2-pyridylmethyl)aminomethyl] phenol). The characterization of complexes 1 and 2 (mainly by X-ray diffraction and potentiometric titration) led us to study their reactivities toward the hydrolysis of the substrate bis(2,4-dinitrophenyl)phosphate (2,4-BDNPP). These studies revealed that complexes 1 and 2 show the best catalytic activity reported so far, with acceleration rates 8.8x10(4) and 9.95x10(5) times faster, respectively, than the uncatalyzed hydrolysis of 2,4-BDNPP. Catalytic activity of 2 on 2,4-DNPP showed that the monoester is hydrolyzed 27 times slower than the 2,4-BDNPP diester under identical experimental conditions. Therefore, 1 and 2 can undoubtedly be considered highly efficient functional models of the phosphohydrolases.
The crystal structures and redox and UV-vis/EPR spectroscopic properties of two new mononuclear copper(II) complexes, [Cu(HL1)Cl2] (1) and [Cu(L1)Cl] (2), prepared through the reaction between copper(II) chloride and the ligand 2-[(bis(pyridylmethyl)amino)methyl]-4-methyl-6-formylphenol (HL1) under distinct base conditions, are reported along with solution studies. Also, we demonstrate that these CuII complexes are able to cleave unactivated peptide bonds from bovine serum albumin (BSA) and the thermostable enzyme Taq DNA polymerase at micromolar concentration, under mild pH and temperature conditions. The cleavage activity seems to be specific with defined proteolytic fragments appearing after protein treatment. The location of the specific cleavage sites was tentatively assigned to solvent-accessible portions of the protein. These are two of the most active Cu(II) complexes described to date, since their cleavage activity is detected in minutes and evidence is here presented for a hydrolytic mechanism mediating protein cleavage by these complexes.
The structure and physicochemistry of the [Ni(II)(AAZ)(2)](ClO(4))(2) (1) complex (AAZ = 6-amino-6-methylperhydro-1,4-diazepine), as a system that is able to mimic some important chelate properties of 1,4,7-triazacyclononane, are reported. The syntheses of a new unsymmetric AAZ-functionalized ligand and the structure of its first heterodinuclear Fe(III)Zn(II) complex are also presented.
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