Synthetic Approaches To Obtain Amino Acid Adducts of 4,4′-Methylenediphenyl Diisocyanate

4,4′-Methylenediphenyl diisocyanate (MDI) is the most important isocyanate used in the chemical industry. Lung sensitization and asthma are the main types of damage after exposure to MDI. Albumin adducts of MDI might be involved in the etiology of sensitization reactions. It is therefore necessary to have sensitive and specific biomarkers such as blood protein adducts to monitor people exposed to isocyanates. For the discovery of new isocyanate adducts with blood proteins present in vivo, new synthetic standards are needed. To achieve this, we developed five methods to obtain amino acid adducts of MDI. We synthesized and isolated MDI adducts of aspartic acid, glutamic acid, cysteine, and valine. The new adducts were characterized by LC-MS/MS and NMR. We synthesized the corresponding isotope-labeled MDI adducts to develop analytical methods using LC-MS/MS. Glutathione adducts of isocyanates are an important way of transportation of the reactive isocyanates to distant sites from the original site of exposure. Therefore, we used <i>N</i>-acetyl-cysteine adducts of MDI as reactants: <i>N</i>-acetyl-<i>S</i>-[[4-(4-aminobenzyl)­phenyl]­carbamoyl]-cysteine (MDI-AcCys) and <i>N</i>-acetyl-<i>S</i>-[[4-(4-acetylaminobenzyl)­phenyl]­carbamoyl]-cysteine (AcMDI-AcCys). MDI-AcCys or AcMDI-AcCys formed adducts with albumin, <i>N</i>_α-acetyl lysine, and valine. Isotope-labeled albumin adducts (= <i>d</i>₄-MDI-albumin) were synthesized from <i>d</i>₄-MDI-AcCys and albumin. <i>d</i>₄-MDI-albumin can be used as an internal standard to analyze biological samples. Such an internal standard will not correct only for the extraction recovery of the adducts but also for the potential variation of the enzymatic digestions used in the procedure to analyze albumin adducts of MDI. The synthetic procedures described in this manuscript will be applicable to the synthesis of amino acid adducts from other isocyanates