Method for enzymatic synthesis of brivaracetam chiral intermediate

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2025270601-A1
Application number	US-202218844349-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Jul 18, 2022
Priority date	Apr 2, 2022
Publication date	Aug 28, 2025
Grant date	—

Abstract

A method for synthesizing a brivaracetam chiral intermediate (R)-3-cyanohexanoic acid by catalyzing the hydrolysis of 3-cyanohexanitile using an enzyme with nitile hydrolysis activity, and the enzyme with nitrile hydrolysis activity is obtained by carrying out a single mutation or a double mutation on an amino acid at position 140 or an amino acid at position 175 in an amino acid sequence as set forth in SEQ ID NO.2. Compared with a wild type, the nitrilase mutant has the activity increased by 10 times, an ee value increased to 300 or more from 39, a substrate conversion rate of 45%, and a product ee which can reach 98.5%, and the yield of (R)-3-aminomethyl-hexanoic acid by catalytic hydrogenation synthesis using (R)-3-cyanohexanoic acid reaches 85% or more. This features a short synthesis route, mild reaction conditions, and high atom economy, and can be applied to the industrial synthesis of the brivaracetam intermediate.

First claim

1 . A method for enzymatic synthesis of a brivaracetam chiral intermediate, which is characterized in that the method is a method for synthesizing a brivaracetam chiral intermediate (R)-3-cyanohexanoic acid by using an enzyme with nitrilase activity to catalyze the hydrolysis of 3-cyanohexanenitrile.

2 . The method according to claim 1 , wherein the method is as follows: forming a reaction system by using wet cells obtained by inducing expression of a recombinant genetically engineered strain containing the gene encoding an enzyme having nitrilase activity as a catalyst, 3-cyanohexanenitrile as a substrate, and a buffer solution of pH 7-8 or water as a medium, carrying out the reaction at 20-40° C. and 200-600 rpm, after the reaction is completed, subjecting the reaction solution to separation and purification to obtain (R)-3-cyanohexanoic acid.

3 . The method according to claim 1 , wherein the enzyme having nitrilase activity is nitrilase.

4 . The method according to claim 3 , wherein the nitrilase is obtained by performing single mutation or double mutation on the amino acid at position 140 or position 175 of the amino acid sequence shown in SEQ ID NO 2.

5 . The method according to claim 4 , wherein the amino acid sequence of the nitrilase is shown in SEQ ID NO. 4 or SEQ ID NO. 6.

6 . The method according to claim 2 , wherein in the reaction system, the amount of the catalyst is 1-10 g/L based on the dry weight of the wet cells, and the concentration of the substrate is 100-300 g/L.

7 . The method of claim 2 , wherein the catalyst is prepared as follows: inoculating the recombinant genetically engineered strain containing the gene encoding the enzyme having nitrilase activity into an LB liquid medium containing 50 μg/mL kanamycin, culturing it overnight at 37° C., inoculating it into an LB culture medium containing 50 μg/mL kanamycin at a volume concentration of 2%, culturing it at 37° C. and 150 rpm until the concentration of the cells reaches OD 600 =0.6, adding IPTG with a final concentration of 0.1 mM, performing induction culture at 28° C. for 12 h, then subjecting the resulting culture to centrifugation at 4° C. and 12000 rpm for 10 min, and collecting wet cells.

8 . The method according to claim 2 , wherein the catalyst is a crude enzyme obtained by disrupting and extracting the wet cells, a pure enzyme after purification of the crude enzyme, immobilized wet cells or immobilized enzyme.

9 . A nitrilase mutant for synthesizing a brivaracetam chiral intermediate of claim 1 , wherein the mutant is obtained by performing single mutation or double mutation on the amino acid at position 140 or position 175 of the amino acid sequence shown in SEQ ID NO 2.

10 . A recombinant genetically engineered strain containing the gene encoding the nitrilase mutant of claim 9 .

Assignees

• Univ Zhejiang Technology

Inventors

• Zheng Renchao
• Zheng Yuguo
• Zhan kan
• Wu Zheming

Classifications

• C07C253/30

  by reactions not involving the formation of cyano groups · CPC title

• C07B2200/07

  Optical isomers · CPC title

• C12R2001/01

  Bacteria or Actinomycetales {; using bacteria or Actinomycetales} · CPC title

• C12N15/70

  Vectors or expression systems specially adapted for E. coli · CPC title

• C12P13/002 Primary

  Nitriles (-CN) · CPC title