Acutimine Synthesis

Steven Castle at Brigham Young University in Utah has come up with a neat route to access acutimine, which possesses selective T-cell activity and anti-amnesic properties.  This comp0und is a challenging polycyclic alkaloid and the synthesis was just as impressive with a neat oxycope rearrangement, hydroamination and the use of BCl3 to promote a michael reaction in situ.  Castle’s synthesis is an amazing accomplishment and he has even beat Sorensen from Princeton to it. You can check Castle’s synthesis out in JACS.

JACS link