Biological and chemical interest in selenium: a brief historical account

Abstract

This review presents a brief account of the discovery, importance, and use of selenium. Based in the importance of selenoproteins, their mechanism of reaction with the participation of selenium, as a selenol (-SeH) group, are indicated. Since the selenol group is the softest nucleophile center found in life, a brief discussion about the synthesis and possible antioxidant and selenoprotein mimetic effects of the organoselenium compounds that can generate the selenol group is presented.

Role of the Chalcogen (S, Se, Te) in the Oxidation Mechanism of the Glutathione Peroxidase Active Site

“…There is currently an intense debate on the biological role of selenium, which so far has been discovered in 25 human proteins in the form of selenocysteine (Sec), and most of these human proteins are key enzymes involved in balancing oxidative stress . The limited presence of selenium is certainly a result of evolutionary pressure, and its involvement in a small number of reactions suggests some advantage over sulfur, which in theory could imitate the physiological role of selenium.…”

Neurodevelopmental Effects of Mercury

“…The strong affinity of E + Hg for −SH and −SeH groups implies that nearly all the E + Hg will be bound to one of these groups. Since −SH is much more abundant than −SeH (Rocha et al 2017), the majority of E + Hg forms will be complexed with −SH groups. In fact, MeHg + can bind to low molecular mass thiol molecules (LMM-SH, e.g., cysteine, glutathione (GSH)) or to cysteinyl residues in proteins or high molecular mass thiol molecules (HMM-SH).…”

“…This is possibly due to the reactivity and nucleophilic softness of the cysteinyl group (Fomenko et al 2008;LoPachin et al 2012). Indeed, the −SH group is the second most powerful soft nucleophile group found in biomolecules, and the first is the −SeH group (Rocha et al 2017). Their high reactivity likely restrained their abundance.…”

Environmentally Compatible Access to α‐Trifluoromethylseleno‐Enones

“…[14] In particular merging of chalcogens and trifluoromethyl group has recently known a growing interest, [15][16][17][18][19][20][21] particularly because of the increased lipophilicity brought by such substituents to the molecules. [22,23] Despite its negative reputation, selenium is an important element either for human physiology [24] or in the design of new compounds for various applications from materials [25,26] to life sciences [27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36] and drug design. [37][38][39][40][41][42][43] Consequently, the design of CF 3 Semolecules constitutes an interesting strategy for the development of new innovative substrates.…”