Pl. Polavarapu et al., DETERMINATION OF ABSOLUTE-CONFIGURATIONS AND PREDOMINANT CONFORMATIONS OF GENERAL INHALATION ANESTHETICS - DESFLURANE, Journal of pharmaceutical sciences, 82(8), 1993, pp. 791-793
Although the mechanism of anesthetic action is not yet clearly underst
ood, ft was recently shown that the pure enantiomers of chiral inhalat
ion anesthetic agents interact differentially with the ion channels in
the central nervous system. This differential interaction was suggest
ed to arise from stereospecific binding of chiral enantiomers to prote
ins. To understand and model the differential nature of binding of ena
ntiomers it is necessary to determine their absolute configurations an
d the number of predominant conformers. From studies on circular dichr
oism in the vibrational transitions of desflurane (CF2HOCHFCF3), we fo
und that (+)-desflurane has the (R)-configuration and (-)-desflurane h
as the (S)-configuration. In addition, each enantiomer existed in two
distinct conformations at room temperature.