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Updated: Jan 15, 2026

Preparation and In Vivo Use of an Activity-based Probe for N-acylethanolamine Acid Amidase
Published on: November 23, 2016
Cyanoacetamidobetaine-A Zwitterionic Nitrile Derivative
Pan Duan1, Julia-Maria Hübner1, Florian Puls1
1Faculty of Chemistry and Food Chemistry, TUD Dresden University of Technology, 01062, Dresden, Germany.
Abstract:
Cyanoacetamidobetaine, or N-cyano-2-(trimethylammonio)acetaminide, is obtained from a reaction of sodium dicyanamide and betainium chloride in an aqueous solution after 4 h at 30 °C. By adding DCM, single-crystals suitable for diffraction experiments are obtained. The compound crystallizes in the monoclinic space group P21/c with lattice parameters a = 7.3365(2) Å, b = 8.8351(3) Å, c = 11.0977(4) Å, and β = 91.948(2)°. The unexpected reaction product comprises a trimethylammonium head group linked via a methylene bridge to a negative cyanoacetaminide moiety, highlighting the thermodynamic preference for intramolecular charge compensation over salt formation of betainium with dicyanamide. The findings are supported by infrared and nuclear magnetic resonance spectra and density functional theory calculations.
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