• Journal of Life Science
• /
• v.12 no.5
• /
• pp.584-588
• /
• 2002

Asymmetric enantioselective resolution system using epoxide hydrolase activity of Aspergillus niger LK was developed and operated for the production of optically pure styrene oxide. Two-phase hollow-fiber reactor system was employed for the enhanced solubility of racemic styrene oxide in organic phase and protection of epoxide hydrolase activity in aqueous phase. For the removal of phenyl-1,2-ethandiol, the inhibitor of epoxide hydrolase, cascade hollow-fiber reactor system was also developed. Chiral (S)-styrene oxide (39 mM in dodecane) could be asymmetrically resolved with high enantiopurity (> 99% ee) using these reactor system.

• KSBB Journal
• /
• v.17 no.4
• /
• pp.321-325
• /
• 2002

Chiral epoxides are valuable intermediates for the asymmetric synthesis of enantiopure bioactive compounds. Microbial epoxide hydrolases (EHs) are newly discovered enzymes and versatile biocatalysts for the preparation of chiral epoxides by enantioselective hydrolysis of cheap and easily available racemic epoxide substrates. EHs are commercially potential biocatalysts due to their characteristics such as high enantioselectivity, cofactor-independent catalysis, and easy-to-Prepare catalysts. In this Paper, recent progresses in biochemistry and molecular biology of EH and developments of novel reaction systems are reviewed to evaluate the commercial feasibility of EH-catalyzed hydrolytic kinetic resolution for the production of chiral epoxides.

• Biotechnology and Bioprocess Engineering:BBE
• /
• v.10 no.3
• /
• pp.167-179
• /
• 2005

Chiral epoxides are highly valuable intermediates, used for the synthesis of pharmaceutical drugs and agrochemicals. They have broad scope of market demand because of their applications. A major challenge in modern organic chemistry is to generate such compounds in high yields, with high stereo- and regio-selectivities. Epoxide hydrolases (EH) are promising biocatalysts for the preparation of chiral epoxides and vicinal diols. They exhibit high enantioselectivity for their substrates, and can be effectively used in the resolution of racemic epoxides through enantioselective hydrolysis. The selective hydrolysis of a racemic epoxide can produce both the corresponding diols and the unreacted epoxides with high enantiomeric excess (ee) value. The potential of microbial EH to produce chiral epoxides and vicinal diol has prompted researchers to explore their use in the synthesis of epoxides and diols with high ee values.

• Journal of Life Science
• /
• v.15 no.5 s.72
• /
• pp.772-778
• /
• 2005

Chiral epoxides are important chiral synthons in organic synthesis for the production of chiral pharmaceuticals and functional food additives. Chiral epoxides can be synthesized by enantioselective introduction of oxygen to double bond of substrate by monooxygenase. Peroxidase also carry out asymmetric epoxidation of alkene in the presence of hydrogen peroxide. Kinetic resolution of racemic epoxides via enantioselective hydrolysis reaction by epoxide hydrolase (EH) is a very promising method since chiral epoxides with a high optical purity can be obtained from cheap and readily available racemic epoxides. In this review, various biocatalytic approaches for the production of chiral epoxides with several examples are presented and their commercial potential is discussed.

• Journal of Life Science
• /
• v.13 no.1
• /
• pp.105-109
• /
• 2003

Epoxide hydrolase (EH) gene from Aspergillus niger #33 was cloned from cDNA library generated by reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR). The nucleotide sequence analysis revealed that the deduced amino acid sequence was almost similiar to that of A. niger LCP521 previously reported. The cloned EH gene was transformed into Saccharomyces cerevisiae and expressed by addition of galactose. The recombinant S. cerevisiae showed hydrolytic activity toward racemic phenyl oxirane substrate based on chiral GC analysis, and can be used as a potential biocatalyst for the preparation of chiral phenyl oxirane.

• Korean Chemical Engineering Research
• /
• v.46 no.4
• /
• pp.769-776
• /
• 2008

The stereoselective synthesis of chiral terminal epoxide is of immense interest due to their utility as versatile starting materials as well as chiral intermediates. In this study, new chiral Co(salen) complexes bearing cobalt(II) chloride, iron(III) chloride and zinc(II) nitrate have been synthesized and characterized. The mass and EXAFS spectra provided the direct evidence of formation of complex. Their catalytic activity and selectivity have been demonstrated for the asymmetric ring opening of terminal epoxides such as styrene oxide and phenylglycidylether by hydrolytic kinetic resolution technology and for the synthesis of glycidyl buthylate. The easily prepared complexes exhibited very high enantioselectivity for the asymmetric ring opening of epoxides with $H_2O$ nucleophile, providing enantiomerically enriched terminal epoxides (>99% ee). The newly synthesized chiral salen showed remakablely enhanced reactivity with substantially low loadings. The system described in this work is very efficient for the sinthesis of chiral epoxide and 1,2-diol intermediates.

• KSBB Journal
• /
• v.20 no.4
• /
• pp.311-316
• /
• 2005

Epoxide hydrolases (EHs) are versatile biocatalysts for the preparation of chiral epoxides by enantioselective hydrolysis from racemic epoxides. Various microorganisms were identified to possess a EH activity by multiple sequence alignment and analysis of conserved domain sequence from genomic and megaplasmid sequence data. We successfully isolated Gordonia westfalica possessing EH activity from various microbial strains from culture type collections. G. westfalica exhibited (R)-styrene oxide preferred enantioselective hydrolysis activity. Chiral (S)-styrene oxide with high optical purity $(>\;99\%)\;ee)$ and yield of $36.5\%$ was obtained from its racemate using whole-cell of G. westfalica.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Life Science Conference
• /
• 2001.11a
• /
• pp.21-28
• /
• 2001

A newly isolated Aspergillus niger possessing the novel epoxide hydrolase(EHase) activity was investigated for the enantioselective hydrolysis of racemic aromatic epoxides. The gene encoding EHase was cloned by RT-PCR, and molecular characteristics of the EHase gene were compared with other microbial EHases. The cloned gene encodes 398 amino acids with a deduced molecular mass of 44.5 kDa and pI of 4.83, and sequence homology with other microbial EHase was low. Functional recombinant EHase could be obtained by heterologous expressions in E. coli. Enantioselectivity of recombinant EHase was tested for valuable aromatic epoxide intermediates. Reaction conditions of EHase-catalyzed asymmetric resolution were optimized for the production of chiral styrene oxide.

• Biotechnology and Bioprocess Engineering:BBE
• /
• v.9 no.1
• /
• pp.62-64
• /
• 2004

The use of enantioselective hydrolysis for preparing chiral epichlorohydrins was investigated using recombinant Pichia pastoris with the enantioselective epoxide hydrolase of Rhodotorula glutinis. The rate of the recombinant epoxide hydrolase-catalyzed enantioselective hydrolysis of racemic epichlorohydrins was enhanced by the addition of 5%(v/v) Tween 20. Enantiopure (R)-epichlorohydrins with an enantiopurity of 100% ee and a yield of 26% were obtained within 5min from 50mM racemates.

• Bulletin of the Korean Chemical Society
• /
• v.33 no.7
• /
• pp.2213-2218
• /
• 2012

Efficient synthetic routes were developed to prepare a sizable amount (4-15 grams) of the chiral epoxides 4-6 as versatile intermediates for the synthesis of aspartyl protease inhibitors of therapeutic interest such as HIV protease and ${\beta}$-secretase. Oxidative cleavage of the C(2)-C(3) double bond of L-ascorbic acid followed by functional group manipulation led to the preparation of the epoxide 10, which was opened with an azide to yield a common aziridine intermediate 12. Through opening of the aziridine ring of 12 with either a carbon or a sulfur nucleophile, chiral epoxide precursors 4-6 could be prepared for various HIV protease inhibitors. Except for the final low melting epoxides 5 and 6, all intermediates were obtained as crystalline solids, thus the synthetic pathway can be easily applied to a large-scale synthesis of the chiral epoxides.