New C(2)‐substituted 8‐alkylsulfanyl‐9‐phenylmethyl‐hypoxanthines III

Title compounds were obtained starting from the key imidazole intermediate, 5‐amino‐1‐phenyl‐methyl‐2‐mercapto‐1 H ‐imidazole‐4‐carboxylic acid amide 5 , readily derived from the base catalyzed rearrangement of a thiazole, 5‐amino‐2‐phenylmethylaminothiazole‐4‐carboxylic acid amide 4 . Alkylation of the thiol function on 5 with phenylmethyl and allylic chlorides gave compounds 6 and 7 respectively. Cyclization of 6 with a variety of esters afforded 8‐phenylmethylthiohypoxanthines, 8–11 . Similarly, 7 was cyclized to 8‐allylthiohypoxanthines, 20–21 . Compound 5 was also cyclized, but formed 8‐mercaptohypox‐anthines, 22–24 . Alkylation of 8‐mercaptohypoxanthines afforded 8‐alkylthiohypoxanthines, 8, 9,25 and 26 (see Scheme 2). Chlorination of 9–11 afforded 16–18 ; adenine 19 was derived from 16 . Oxidation of hypox‐anthines 8–11 with m ‐chloroperbenzoic acid gave the corresponding 8‐phenylmethylsulfonyl derivatives 12 ‐ 15 . These derivatives proved resistant to nucleophilic displacement reactions with primary amines.