Asymmetric Synthesis of C-Glycosylated Amino Acids : Incorporation in Collagen Glycopeptides and Evaluation in a Model for Rheumatoid Arthritis

This thesis describes stereoselective syntheses of four amino acids, three of which are C-glycosidic analogues of glycosylated amino acids. The overall goal of the project was to probe the interactions between MHC molecules, glycopeptide antigens and T cell receptors, that are essential for development of collagen induced arthritis. Collagen induced arthritis is a frequently used mouse model for rheumatoid arthritis, an autoimmune disease that attacks joint cartilage and leads to a painful and eventually crippling condition. The thesis is based on four studies. The first study describes the synthesis of hydroxylysine, an amino acid that is found in collagen and is an important constituent of the glycopeptide proposed as an antigen in collagen induced arthritis. During the synthesis of hydroxylysine some new insight into the mechanism of the reductive opening of p-methoxybenzylidene acetals was obtained. The remaining three studies deals with the synthesis of C-glycosidic analogues of glycosylated amino acids, hydroxy norvaline, threonine and hydroxylysine.The synthesis of each amino acid required control of several stereogenic centra and utilizes a variety of approaches such as use of stereoselective reactions, chiral auxilaries, chiral templates and asymmetric catalysis. The C-glycosidic analogues of galactosylated hydroxynorvaline and hydroxylysine were incorporated in glycopeptides from type II collagen and evaluated in T cell response assays. It was found that the T cells were stimulated by the C-glycopeptides, but that higher concentrations were required than for the native O-glycopeptid