New quinone-amino acid conjugates linked via a vinylic spacer.

Chloranil and 2,3-dichloro-1,4-naphthoquinone have been linked to different natural and unnatural amino acids via a vinylic spacer. Two routes were developed for the facile preparation of these novel modified amino acids: the direct method, which can only be applied to secondary amines, and the indirect method (transamination reaction), which can be applied to any amino acid or ester.