J. Scheinkonig et al., METHYLATION OF THE BETA-POSITIONS OF THE FURAN RING IN F-ACIDS, Biochimica et biophysica acta, L. Lipids and lipid metabolism, 1254(1), 1995, pp. 73-76
Major incubation products in feeding experiments with the sodium salt
of 7-(5-butyl-furan-2-yl)heptanoic acid (3) on suspension cultures of
Saccharum spec, are the unusual F-acids (4a) and (4b). They possess in
contrast to natural monomethyl substituted F-acids a methyl substitue
nt in the 4-position of the furan ring. Unexpectedly, the dimethyl sub
stituted F-acids (4c) and (4d) were found only in very small amounts.
The detection and structure elucidation of the methylation products (4
a)-(4d) was achieved predominantly by GC-MS analysis of the correspond
ing tetrahydrofuran derivatives (5a)-(5d).