China takes the lead in realizing the efficient synthesis of artemisinin, an antimalarial drug

A study by Shanghai Jiao Tong University is expected to rescue nearly a million people from the death line every year. This is the news that the reporter learned from the press conference held by Shanghai Jiaotong University today.

The scientific research team led by Shanghai Jiaotong University professor Zhang Wanbin, which lasted seven years, after numerous experiments, developed a routine method of chemical synthesis, for the first time effective synthesis of artemisinin, an antimalarial drug, which enabled artemisinin to achieve large scale Industrial production. This achievement is expected to solve the major problems of artificial synthesis of artemisinin that has plagued the world's pharmaceutical industry for many years, making artemisinin-based drugs cheaper and more readily available, and is expected to rescue nearly a million people each year from the death line.

Malaria is known as hernia in ancient China and is also known as pendulum. It is a global acute parasitic infection transmitted by malaria mosquitoes. It is characterized by periodic chills, fever, headache, sweating, and anemia and splenomegaly. Child incidence High, mostly popular in summer and autumn. According to the statistics of the World Health Organization, there are as many as 300 to 500 million people infected with malaria each year in the world, and nearly 1 million people died of lack of effective medical treatment.

In 1972, our research team for carcass arteries isolated artemisinin, and found that the compound has a very good effect of treating malaria. This discovery has inspired the global medical community. Later, our scientists synthesized a variety of artemisinin derivatives, such as dihydroartemisinin, artemether, and artesunate. In 2004, artemisinin drugs have been used as the drug of choice for malaria treatment worldwide.

However, for many years, artemisinin as an important strategic material, its highly effective artificial synthesis has been a major challenge for the world's scientific and technological communities and industry. Can not be large-scale industrial production and high extraction costs, so that artemisinin prices are not cheap, even known as "high price drugs", "noble drugs." Each year, although the World Health Organization distributes a portion of artemisinin-based drugs to malaria-prone areas, most people can only “expect medicine” and allow malaria to devour their lives.

Can we use chemical synthesis to produce artemisinin in large quantities? Scientists at home and abroad have also made numerous attempts, but so far there has been no news of industrial production.

Zhang Wanbin led the chiral synthesis and catalysis team, starting from 2005 to carry out research work in this area. After 7 years of exploration and hard work, great progress has finally been made in the near future. Zhang Wanbin's team used a specific catalyst they discovered to obtain dihydroartemisinic acid in a convenient and efficient manner by dihydroartemisinin obtained after the reduction of artemisinic acid through a conventional synthesis route that does not require light irradiation. Then, artemisinin can be obtained in high yield by oxidation rearrangement. This method has a short synthetic route and high yield. Because it does not require special chemical reaction conditions such as light, it is suitable for large-scale industrial production.

The major breakthrough of this achievement is that raw materials can be obtained by biofermentation of wastes or monosaccharides extracted from artemisinin. Key chemical catalysts can be used to achieve conventional chemical synthesis, facilitating large-scale, industrial production. At the same time, the results yielded artemisinin in a high yield of approximately 60%, and the synthesis efficiency was high.

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