Concise access to N9-mono-, N2-mono- and N2,N9-di-substituted guanines via efficient Mitsunobu reactions

Guanine poses several problems to the synthetic chemist owing to its polyfunctional nature and poor solubility. Over the past few decades, synthetic guanines have found applications as anti-cancer and anti-viral agents. Coupled with the ever-growing interest in designer PNAs and G-quartets, simple and efficient synthetic routes to novel guanines would be of significant benefit. We herein report that, upon simple protection and/or activation step(s), the guanine precursor 2-amino-6-chloropurine is rendered an excellent substrate for Mitsunobu chemistry, furnishing, after subsequent hydrolytic dechlorination and appropriate deprotection step(s), the desired N9-mono-, N2-mono- or N2,N9-di-substituted guanines in excellent yields (≥80%). Importantly, we demonstrate that N9-functionalization proceeds with very good N9/N7 regioselectivity and with complete inversion of stereochemistry.