As part of the dramatic changes associated with the need for preparing compound libraries in pharmaceutical and agrochemical research laboratories, industry searches for new technologies that allow for the automation of synthetic processes. Since the pioneering work by Merrifield polymeric supports have been identified to play a key role in this field however, polymer-assisted solution-phase synthesis which utilizes immobilized reagents and catalysts has only recently begun to flourish. Polymer-assisted solution-phase synthesis has various advantages over conventional solution-phase chemistry, such as the ease of separation of the supported species from a reaction mixture by filtration and washing, the opportunity to use an excess of the reagent to force the reaction to completion without causing workup problems, and the adaptability to continuous-flow processes. Various strategies for employing functionalized polymers stoichiometrically have been developed. Apart from reagents that are covalently or ionically attached to the polymeric backbone and which are released into solution in the presence of a suitable substrate, scavenger reagents play an increasingly important role in purifying reaction mixtures. Employing functionalized polymers in solution-phase synthesis has been shown to be extremely useful in automated parallel synthesis and multistep sequences. So far, compound libraries containing as many as 88 members have been generated by using several polymer-bound reagents one after another. Furthermore, it has been demonstrated that complex natural products like the alkaloids (+/-)-oxomaritidine and (+/-)-epimaritidine can be prepared by a sequence of five and six consecutive polymer-assisted steps, respectively, and the potent analgesic compound (+/-)-epibatidine in twelve linear steps ten of which are based on functionalized polymers. These developments reveal the great future prospects of polymer-assisted solution-phase synthesis.

A series of potent hydroxyethyl amine (HEA) derived inhibitors of β-site APP cleaving enzyme (BACE1) was optimized to address suboptimal pharmacokinetics and poor CNS partitioning. This work identified a series of benzodioxolane analogues that possessed improved metabolic stability and increased oral bioavailability. Subsequent efforts focused on improving CNS exposure by limiting susceptibility to Pgp-mediated efflux and identified an inhibitor which demonstrated robust and sustained reduction of CNS β-amyloid (Aβ) in Sprague–Dawley rats following oral administration.

A general strategy for the total synthesis of the antitumor agent apoptolidin (1) is proposed, and the chemical synthesis of the defined key building blocks (4, 5, 6, 8, and 9) in their enantiomerically pure forms is described. The projected total synthesis calls for a dithiane coupling reaction to construct the C(20)-C(21) bond, a Stille coupling reaction to form the C(11)-C(12) bond, and a Yamaguchi macrolactonization to assemble the macrolide ring, as well as two glycosidation reactions to fuse the carbohydrate units onto the molecule. First and second generation syntheses to the required fragments for apoptolidin (1) are described.

The total synthesis of apoptolidin (1) is reported together with the design, synthesis, and biological evaluation of a number of analogues. The assembly of key fragments 6 and 7 to vinyl iodide 3 via dithiane coupling technology was supplemented by a second generation route to this advanced intermediate involving a Horner-Wadsworth-Emmons coupling of fragments 22 and 25. The final stages of the synthesis featured a Stille coupling between vinyl iodide 3 and vinylstannane 2, a Yamaguchi lactonization, a number of glycosidations, and final deprotection. The developed synthetic technology was applied to the construction of several analogues including 74, 75, and 77 which exhibit significant bioactivity against tumor cells.