Rearrangement of catharanthine, stemmadenine, and tabersonine in acetic acid

Abstract

Treatment of tabersonine with refluxing acetic acid under nitrogen yielded a new base, allocatharanthine (VI), and the derived (VII), but failed to produce detectable quantities of (±)-catharanthine or pseudocatharanthine, nor did similar treatment of stemmadenine afford any of these compounds.