Chemo-enzymatic total synthesis: current approaches toward the integration of chemical and enzymatic transformations

Abstract

A steadily increasing number of reports have been published on chemo-enzymatic synthesis methods that integrate biosynthetic enzymatic transformations with chemical conversions. This review focuses on the total synthesis of natural products and classifies the enzymatic reactions into three categories. The total synthesis of five natural products: cotylenol, trichodimerol, chalcomoracin, tylactone, and saframycin A, as well as their analogs, is outlined with an emphasis on comparing these chemo-enzymatic syntheses with the corresponding natural biosynthetic pathways.

Keywords

• chemo-enzymatic synthesis
• late-stage modification
• reactive biosynthetic intermediate
• regio- and stereoselective (macro)cyclization
• total synthesis