Total Synthesis of the Antiviral Natural Product Houttuynoid B

The first total synthesis of houttuynoid B, a powerful antiviral flavonoid glycoside from the Chinese plant Houttuynia cordata, is described. In a key step, a Baker-Venkataraman rearrangement employing an already glycosylated substrate was used to efficiently set up the fully functionalized carbon skeleton. The required benzofuran building block was prepared through a domino Sonogashira coupling/5-endo-dig cyclization and converted into a stable 1-hydroxybenzotriazole-derived active ester prior to linking with a galactosylated hydroxyacetophenone unit. The elaborated synthesis requires only nine steps (11 % overall yield) along the longest linear sequence and paves the way for the preparation of structurally related compounds for further biological evaluation.