A Synchrotron Radiation Study of Nitroimidazoles and their Derivatives

Nitroimidazole derived molecules are used in radiotherapy thanks to their capability to sensitize hypoxic tumor cells to radiation by ‘mimicking’ the effects of the presence of oxygen as a damaging agent. Inthis work we present the results of a bottom-up approach, which goes from the model molecule to the real drugs used in therapy. Mass spectrometry and several spectroscopic techniques (XPS, PES, NEXAFS, PEPICO) basedon the use of synchrotron radiation have been combined with computational methods to link the electronic and geometric structure of the molecule to their functions.The investigation of the fragmentation patterns of the nitroimidazole isomers [1,2] has allowed to understand their capacity to produce reactive molecular species like nitric oxide, carbon monoxide or hydrogencyanide and their potential impact on the biological system. Guided by these results, the fragmentation mechanisms of metronidazole and misonidazole, the two radiosensitisers built on the 5-nitroimidazole and 2-nitroimidazole compounds used in therapy, as well as the 1-Methyl-5-nitroimidazole have been investigated. The results on these more complex systems suggest that different mechanisms are active. The release of nitric oxideis hampered by the efficient formation of nitrous acid or nitrogen dioxide and the long and branched tails attached to the imidazole ring increase the ring stability, providing an efficient channel for excess energy dissipation

Insights into 2-Chloropyrimidine fragmentation through a thermochemical analysis of the ionic fragments

In the present work we have studied the photoinduced ion chemistry of the 2Cl-pyrimidine molecule in the energy region 9−14 eV. The theoretical gas phase enthalpies of formation of the main fragments calculated using the G3B3 and G2 ab initio methods are compared to the experimental values, derived by the measured appearance energy of the fragments. This approach provides new insights into both the geometric structure of the ionic fragments and the basic mechanisms governing the molecular fragmentation

Insights into 2-Chloropyrimidine fragmentation through a thermochemical analysis of the ionic fragments

In the present work we have studied the photoinduced ion chemistry of the 2Cl-pyrimidine molecule in the energy region 9−14 eV. The theoretical gas phase enthalpies of formation of the main fragments calculated using the G3B3 and G2 ab initio methods are compared to the experimental values, derived by the measured appearance energy of the fragments. This approach provides new insights into both the geometric structure of the ionic fragments and the basic mechanisms governing the molecular fragmentation

A study of the valence photoelectron spectrum of uracil and mixed water-uracil clusters

International audienceThe valence ionization of uracil and mixed water-uracil clusters has been studied experimentally and by ab initio calculations. In both measurements the spectrum onset shows a red shift with respect to uracil molecule, with the mixed cluster characterized by peculiar features unexplained by the sum of independent contributions of the water or uracil aggregation. To interpret and assign all the contributions, we performed a series of multi-level calculations, starting from an exploration of several cluster structures using automated conformer-search algorithms based on a tight-binding approach. Ionization energies have been assessed on smaller clusters via a comparison between accurate wavefunction-based approaches and cost-effective DFT-based simulations, the latter applied to clusters up to twelve uracil and thirty-six water molecules. The results confirm that i) the bottom-up approach based on a multilevel method (Mattioli et al. PCCP 23, 2021, 1859) to the structure of neutral clusters of unknown experimental composition converges to precise structure-property relationships and ii) the coexistence of pure and mixed clusters in the wateruracil samples. A natural bond orbital (NBO) analysis performed on a subset of clusters highlighted the special role of H-bonds in the formation of the aggregates. The NBO analysis yields a second-order perturbative energy between H-bond donor and acceptor orbitals correlated with the calculated ionization energies. This sheds light on the role of the oxygen lone-pairs of the uracil CO group in the formation of strong H-bonds, with a stronger directionality in mixed clusters, giving quantitative explanation for the formation of core-shell structures