The Structure of Thiobinupharidine

Abstract

The spectroscopic properties of thiobinupharidine and its isomer, neothiobinupharidine, of established structure, have been examined and compared. From this study it was possible to deduce the structure and relative configuration of the alkaloid. The structure has been firmly established and the absolute configuration determined by the study of the crystal structure of thiobinupharidine dihydrobromide dihydrate, C30H42O2N2S•2HBr•2H2O. The crystals are orthorhombic with space group C2221, a = 25.128(6), b = 9.869(2), c = 26.380(6) Å, and Z = 8. The structure was refined, using full-matrix least-squares techniques with 1934 reflections, to a final R value of 0.097. The thiobinupharidine moiety hydrogen bonds to one of two types of H2O–Br–H2O spiral chains in the structure. The tetrahydrothiophene ring is distorted from planarity, and this together with the nonequivalence of the S and C atoms in the ring causes the molecule to deviate from C2 symmetry