An efficient method for the preparation of 1'alpha-branched-chain sugar pyrimidine ribonucleosides from uridine: the first conversion of a natural nucleoside into 1'-substituted ribonucleosides.

The 1'alpha-phenylselenouridine derivative 13 was successfully synthesized by enolization of the 3',5'-O-TIPDS-2'-ketouridine 8, and was subjected to a radical reaction with a vinylsilyl tether--an efficient procedure for preparing 1'alpha-branched-chain sugar pyrimidine nucleosides. Successive treatment of 8 with LiHMDS and PhSeCl in THF at < -70 degrees C gave the desired 1'-phenylseleno products in 85% yield as an anomeric mixture of the 1'alpha-product 11 and the 1'beta-product 12 (11/12= 2.5:1). Highly stereoselective reduction at the 2'-carbonyl of the 1'alpha-product 11 occurred from the beta-face by using NaBH4/CeCl3 in MeOH, and subsequent introduction of a dimethylvinylsilyl tether at the 2'-hydroxyl gave the radical reaction substrate 14. The photochemical radical atom-transfer reaction of 14 by using a high-pressure mercury lamp proceeded effectively in benzene to give the exo-cyclized PhSe-transferred product 18, in which (PhSe)2 proved to be essential as an additive for radical atom-transfer cyclization reactions. Subsequent phenylseleno-group elimination of 18 gave the sugar-protected 1'alpha-vinyluridine. With this procedure, 1'alpha-vinyluridine (22) and -cytidine (25), designed to be potential antitumor agents, were successfully synthesized. This study is the first example of functionalization at the anomeric 1'-position of a nucleoside by starting from a natural nucleoside to produce a ribo-type 1'-modified nucleoside.