Artificial Macrocycles by Ugi Reaction and Passerini Ring Closure

Artificial macrocycles can be convergently synthesized by a sequence of an Ugi multicomponent reaction (MCR) followed by an intramolecular Passerini MCR used to close the macrocycle. Significantly, in this work, the first intramolecular macrocyclization through a Passerini reaction is described. We describe 21 macrocycles of a size of 15-20. The resulting macrocyclic depsipeptides are model compounds for natural products and could find applications in drug discovery.