Spiroketals

In chemistry, Spiroketals are structural motifs composed of two heterocycles sharing one central carbon which makes them a subclass of spiro compound.

Their structural specificity lays on the presence of one oxygen atom in each ring, in alpha of the spiro carbon.

Like diarrheic shellfish poisoning (DSP) class of toxins containing in the okadaic acid and ancanthafolicin.

[2] Due to its non-planar substructure, the spiroketal motif gain interest among the academical and industrial pharmaceutical research fields, both in structure-based drug design (SBDD) and development of screening libraries.

The avermectins appear to paralyze nematodes and arthropods by potentiating the presynaptic release of gamma-aminobutyric acid, thereby blocking post-synaptic transmission of nerve impulses[4] Tofogliflozin is an inhibitor of human sodium glucose cotransporter 2 (hSGLT2) and was approved in 2014 in Japan for the treatment of Type 2 diabetes[5] The most employed method to ring close spiroketal consists in the hydrolysis of the dihydroxyketal in acidic conditions, but this method is not granting stereocontrol.