Synthesis of Nontoxic Fluorous Sphingolipids as Molecular Probes of Exogenous Metabolic Studies for Rapid Enrichment by Fluorous Solid Phase Extraction

Abstract

Fluorous solid‐phase extraction (FSPE) is a useful technique for efficient selective enrichment of fluorous compounds from nonfluorous molecules. Sphingolipids and their metabolites, which are ubiquitous building blocks of eukaryotic and prokaryotic cell membranes, play crucial roles, for example, as signaling molecules. However, details of the functions and metabolic mechanisms of exogenous sphingolipids have remained unknown compared with those of their endogenous analogs. To better understand these unknown roles, chemical probes with appropriate biological and physicochemical properties are needed. In this study, we designed and synthesized new fluorous sphingolipids to reveal these roles. Furthermore, we confirmed that they could be efficiently and rapidly separated from normal sphingolipids by FSPE, and that they hardly showed any cytotoxic activity, similarly to normal sphingolipids at the same dose. We also showed that these fluorinated ceramides could act as metabolic substrates for sphingomyelin synthase 2 (SMS2). This demonstrates their potential for further biological studies.