An Enzymatic Flow-Based Preparative Route to Vidarabine.

The bi-enzymatic synthesis of the antiviral drug vidarabine (arabinosyladenine, ara-A), catalyzed by uridine phosphorylase from (UP) and a purine nucleoside phosphorylase from (PNP), was re-designed under continuous-flow conditions. Glyoxyl-agarose and EziG1 (Opal) were used as immobilization carriers for carrying out this preparative biotransformation. Upon setting-up reaction parameters (substrate concentration and molar ratio, temperature, pressure, residence time), 1 g of vidarabine was obtained in 55% isolated yield and >99% purity by simply running the flow reactor for 1 week and then collecting (by filtration) the nucleoside precipitated out of the exiting flow. Taking into account the substrate specificity of UP and PNP, the results obtained pave the way to the use of the UP/PNP-based bioreactor for the preparation of other purine nucleosides.