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In the battle against the illicit drugs market, methodologies have been developed by forensic laboratories to address the determination of the origin and dismantlement of the trafficking route for various target molecules such as heroin and cocaine. These drug profiling methods are not straightforward, especially when the target molecules are synthetic and very pure, resulting in poorly informative impurity profiles, e.g. new psychoactive substances and cutting agents. A tool based on the determination of intramolecular isotopic profiles has been developed to provide origin discrimination with a new way to profile seized cutting agents and heroin samples. Whereas stable isotope analyses by mass spectrometry give the bulk isotopic composition, nuclear magnetic resonance gives direct access to the position‐specific isotope content at natural abundance. This report shows how both 13C NMR spectrometry and 13C, 15N MS might provide complementary and valuable information to link seized caffeine and paracetamol to their origin. Here, isotopic ratio monitoring by 13C NMR (irm‐13C NMR) offers additional benefits over irm‐MS in its capability to determine a detailed isotopic profile, leading to a better method to distinguish different caffeine and paracetamol batches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Triacylglycerols, which are quasi-universal components of food matrices, consist of complex mixtures of molecules. Their site-specific C content, their fatty acid profile, and their position on the glycerol moiety may significantly vary with the geographical, botanical, or animal origin of the sample. Such variables are valuable tracers for food authentication issues. The main objective of this work was to develop a new method based on a rapid and precise C-NMR spectroscopy (using a polarization transfer technique) coupled with multivariate linear regression analyses in order to quantify the whole set of individual fatty acids within triacylglycerols. In this respect, olive oil samples were analyzed by means of both adiabatic C-INEPT sequence and gas chromatography (GC). For each fatty acid within the studied matrix and for squalene as well, a multivariate prediction model was constructed using the deconvoluted peak areas of C-INEPT spectra as predictors, and the data obtained by GC as response variables. This C-NMR-based strategy, tested on olive oil, could serve as an alternative to the gas chromatographic quantification of individual fatty acids in other matrices, while providing additional compositional and isotopic information. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The leaves of Chromolaena odorata (Asteraceae) are exploited extensively in West and Central African ethnopharmacy for the treatment of a wide range of conditions, despite this being a non-native species established in the last 50 years. With the objective of seeking bioactive principles, the nonvolatile compounds, an ethanolic (80% v/v) extract was made and fractionated. From the hexane-soluble fraction, three compounds were isolated. Two of these, 5-hydroxy-7,4′-dimethoxyflavanone and 2′-hydroxy-4,4′,5′,6′-tetramethoxychalcone, have previously been identified in C. odorata leaves. The third was fully characterised spectroscopically and found to be 1,6-dimethyl-4-(1-methylethyl)naphthalene (cadalene), not previously isolated from the Asteraceae. All three compounds were tested for their cytotoxicity and anticancer properties. 2′-Hydroxy-4,4′,5′,6′-tetramethoxychalcone was found to be both cytotoxic and anticlonogenic at 20 µ m in cell lines Cal51, MCF7 and MDAMB-468, and to act synergistically with the Bcl2 inhibitor ABT737 to enhance apoptosis in Cal51 breast cancer cells. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This present study identifies a number of azolyl-substituted indoles as potent inhibitors of aromatase. In the sub-series of 3-(azolylmethyl)-1H-indoles, four imidazole derivatives and their triazole analogues were tested. Imidazole derivatives 11 and 14 in which the benzyl moiety was substituted by 2-chloro and 4-cyano groups, respectively, were the most active, with IC50 values ranging between 0.054 and 0.050 μM. In the other sub-series, eight 3-(α-azolylbenzyl)-1H-indoles were prepared and tested. Compound 30, the N-ethyl imidazole derivative, proved to be an aromatase inhibitor, showing an IC50 value of 0.052 μM. All target compounds were further evaluated against 17α-hydroxylase/C17,20-lyase to determine their selectivity profile. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study was designed to follow our pharma-comodulation work in the field of non-steroidal aromatase inhibitors. All target compounds 12a-h and 28a-h were tested in vitro for human placental aroma-tase inhibition, using testosterone or androstenedione the substrate for the aromatase enzyme and the IC30 and relative potency to aminoglutethimide data are included. A SAR study indicated that 3-[(4-fluorophenyl)(1 Himidazol-1-yl) methyl]-1-ethyl-2-methyl-1H-indole (28g) was a highly potent and selective aromatase inhibitor with IC50 value of 0.025 µM. 28 g was also a weak inhibitor of androstenedione synthesis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]