Preparation and characterization of a new artemisinin-derived dimer

Abstract

A new dimer (1) that is likely to be a reduction metabolite of arteether (2), the potent antimalarial agent, was prepared from deoxydihydroartemisinin (3). The identity of 1 was established from spectral data and was confirmed by X-ray crystallographic analysis. In addition, the stereochemistry of the related, previously reported dimer (4), is now more clearly defined, based on revising its X-ray crystallographic data.