End-to-End Automated Synthesis of C(sp3)-Enriched Drug-like Molecules via Negishi Coupling and Novel, Automated Liquid–Liquid Extraction

• Irini Abdiaj^a
• Santiago Cañellas^a
• Alejandro Dieguez^a
• Maria Lourdes Linares^a
• Brenda Pijper^a
• Alberto Fontana^a
• Raquel Rodriguez^a
• Andres Trabanco^a
• Eduardo Palao^a
• Jesus Alcázar*^a

• ^aDiscovery Chemistry, Janssen Research and Development, Janssen-Cilag, S.A., C/ Jarama 75, E-45007Toledo, Spain

Herein, we report an end-to-end process including synthesis, work-up, purification, and post-purification with minimal human intervention using Negishi coupling as a key transformation to increase Fsp3 in bioactive molecules. The main advantages of this protocol are twofold. First, the automated sequential generation of organozinc reagents from readily available alkyl halides offers a large diversity of alkyl groups to functionalize (hetero)aryl halide scaffolds via Pd-catalyzed Negishi coupling in continuous flow. Second, a fully automated liquid–liquid extraction has been developed and successfully applied for unattended operations. The workflow was completed with mass-triggered preparative high-performance liquid chromatography HPLC, providing an efficient production line of compounds with enriched sp3 character and better drug-like properties. The modular nature allows a smooth adaptation to a wide variety of synthetic methods and protocols and makes it applicable to any medchem laboratory.

Read the publication that featured this abstract