Flavonoids and proanthocyanidins are potent anti-oxidants and have recently found considerable interest in their potential for reducing risks or treatments of heart disease, cancer, and microbial infections. To make further progress in understanding the biological significance of these compounds, it is necessary to provide biologists with gram to kilogram amounts of pure compounds at a reasonable price. It is also necessary to be able to assure the potential to produce tonnage quantities should drug discovery and development be successful. Because oligomeric proanthocyanidins are usually found in only low concentrations even in plant tissues containing high concentrations of tannins, production of these compounds in gram quantities by direct extraction is usually not feasible. Therefore, this research is directed to optimizing ways to use abundant agricultural waste products as a source of flavan-3-ol derivatives that can be used as intermediates in the "semi-syntheses" of a wide variety of plant proanthocyanidin derivatives. Successful development of processes to produce these flavan-3-ol derivatives will open the door to production of a wide variety of proanthocyanidin derivatives and allow us to optimize the biological properties of these compounds.
Anticipated Results/Potential Commercial Applications of Research: It is anticipated that we will be able to use the tannins in agricultural waste products as a source of flavan-3-ol derivatives. Successful production of these compounds will provide intermediates useful in making a wide variety of bioactive proanthocyanidins in gram or even tonnage quantity and thereby overcome a major obstacle to drug discovery and development from plant polyphenols. Success in this work should stimulate all aspects of our business from consulting with other companies and universities to sales of fine chemicals.
