Despite continuous efforts to control cariogenic dental biofilms, very few effective antimicrobial treatments exist. In this study, we characterized the activity of the novel synthetic cyclic lipopeptide 4 (CLP-4), derived from fusaricidin, against the cariogenic pathogenStreptococcus mutansUA159. We determined CLP-4's MIC, minimum bactericidal concentration (MBC), and spontaneous resistance frequency, and we performed time-kill assays. Additionally, we assessed CLP-4's potential to inhibit biofilm formation and eradicate preformed biofilms. Our results demonstrate that CLP-4 has strong antibacterial activityin vitroand is a potent bactericidal agent with low spontaneous resistance frequency. At a low concentration of 5 μg/ml, CLP-4 completely inhibitedS. mutansUA159 biofilm formation, and at 50 μg/ml, it reduced the viability of established biofilms by >99.99%. We also assessed CLP-4's cytotoxicity and stability against proteolytic digestion. CLP-4 withstood trypsin or chymotrypsin digestion even after treatment for 24 h, and our toxicity studies showed that CLP-4 effective concentrations had negligible effects on hemolysis and the viability of human oral fibroblasts. In summary, our findings showed that CLP-4 is a potent antibacterial and antibiofilm agent with remarkable stability and low nonspecific cytotoxicity. Hence, CLP-4 is a promising novel antimicrobial peptide with potential for clinical application in the prevention and treatment of dental caries.

Studies directed toward the oxidative and reductive desulfurization of readily available 2′-S-aryl-2′-thiouridine derivatives were investigated with the prospect to functionalize the C2′-position of nucleosides. The oxidative desulfurization-difluorination strategy was successful on 2-(arylthio)alkanoate surrogates, while extension of the combination of oxidants and fluoride sources was not an efficient fluorination protocol when applied to 2′-S-aryl-2′-thiouridine derivatives, resulting mainly in C5-halogenation of the pyrimidine ring and C2′-monofluorination without desulfurization. Cyclic voltammetry of 2′-arylsulfonyl-2′-deoxyuridines and their 2′-fluorinated analogues showed that cleavage of the arylsulfone moiety could occur, although at relatively high cathodic potentials. While reductive-desulfonylation of 2′-arylsulfonyl-2′-deoxyuridines with organic electron donors (OEDs) gave predominantly base-induced furan type products, chemical (OED) and electrochemical reductive-desulfonylation of the α-fluorosulfone derivatives yielded the 2′-deoxy-2′-fluorouridine and 2′,3′-didehydro-2′,3′-dideoxy-2′-fluorouridine derivatives. These results provided good evidence of the generation of a C2′-anion through carbon-sulfur bond cleavage, opening new horizons for the reductive-functionalization approaches in nucleosides.

Gemcitabine is a modified cytidine analog having two fluorine atoms at the 2′-position of the ribose ring. It has been proposed that gemcitabine inhibits RNR activity by producing a C3′• intermediate via direct H3′-atom abstraction followed by loss of HF to yield a C2′• with 3′-keto moiety. Direct detection of C3′• and C2′• during RNR inactivation by gemcitabine still remains elusive. To test the influence of 2′- substitution on radical site formation, electron spin resonance (ESR) studies are carried out on one-electron oxidized gemcitabine and other 2′-modified analogs, i.e., 2′-deoxy-2′-fluoro-2′-C-methylcytidine (MeFdC) and 2′-fluoro-2′-deoxycytidine (2′-FdC). ESR line components from two anisotropic β-2′-F-atom hyperfine couplings identify the C3′• formation in one-electron oxidized gemcitabine, but no further reaction to C2′• is found. One-electron oxidized 2′-FdC is unreactive toward C3′• or C2′• formation. In one-electron oxidized MeFdC, ESR studies show C2′• production presumably from a very unstable C3′• precursor. The experimentally observed hyperfine couplings for C2′• and C3′• match well with the theoretically predicted ones. C3′• to C2′• conversion in one-electron oxidized gemcitabine and MeFdC has theoretically been modeled by first considering the C3′• and H₃O⁺ formation via H3′-proton deprotonation and the subsequent C2′• formation via HF loss induced by this proximate H₃O⁺. Theoretical calculations show that in gemcitabine, C3′• to C2′• conversion in the presence of a proximate H₃O⁺ has a barrier in agreement with the experimentally observed lack of C3′• to C2′• conversion. In contrast, in MeFdC, the loss of HF from C3′• in the presence of a proximate H₃O⁺ is barrierless resulting in C2′• formation which agrees with the experimentally observed rapid C2′• formation.