Although antiretroviral therapies have been effective in decreasing active viral loads in AIDS patients, the persistence of latent viral reservoirs prevents eradication of the virus. Prostratin and DPP (12-deoxyphorbol-13-phenylacetate) activate the latent HIV and thus represent promising adjuvants for antiviral therapy. Their limited supply and the challenges of accessing related structures have, however, impeded therapeutic development and the search for superior analogs.
I will present a practical synthesis of prostratin, DPP, and their synthetic analogs. This synthesis provides a solution to the supply issue of these therapeutically promising natural products and opens access to a variety of new analogs.