Chapter 2 The Eburnamine-Vincamine Alkaloids

Publisher Summary The alkaloids eburnamine from Hunteria eburnea Pichon and vincamine from Vinca minor are the prototypes of the indole alkaloid class eburnaminevincamine. The alkaloids of this class are derivatives of ring skeletons of the same constitution. The absolute configurations of alkaloids belonging to this series have been established and progress has been made in clarifying the relative and absolute stereochemistry of several. NMR spectroscopy and mass spectrometry have proved useful tools in the structure analysis of certain eburnamine-vincamine alkaloids, although, yet, neither has been utilized extensively.