Since epoxides, which are found as natural products, show a wide range of biological activities, scientists have
always been interested in studies on this subject. There are epoxides with very different substituents in the
literature. For example, epoxides with lactone as paniculide A, amino as anticapsin, hydroxide as Eutypoxide B
and Eutypoxide C are used as drugs by showing biological activity. Based on the studies in the literature, we
planned to study the biological activity of molecules that do not contain amino, lactone and hydroxyl groups. For
this purpose, we first performed the Diels-Alder reaction of 2,3-dimethyl-1,3-butadiene (1) with benzoquinone
(2), in the next step, epoxidation reaction was targeted. Our research group previously showed that epoxide
derivatives with anticancer properties effectively decrease cell viability of the ovarian cancer line (SKOV) and
suppress cell migration of the line.
Drugs are metabolized by the body and their metabolic residues are eliminated to aquatic systems. Therefore, it
has become important to investigate the aquatic toxicity of drugs. Daphnia toxicity test is widely applied in aquatic
toxicity studies. In this study, the chronic toxicity in water of the epoxide derivative 4 with six different
concentration (2 nM, 5 nM, 10 nM, 20 nM, 40 nM, 60 nM) was analyzed using model organism Dapnia magna.
Each experiment was repeated three times. The experiments were conducted under laboratory conditions at 20±2
oC. The 96-h chronic LC50 value were determined. According to the results, the epoxide derivative formed chronic
toxic effects on the Daphnia neonates. LC50 value of the epoxide derivative 4 was found 32,05 nM after 96-h.
The results showed that doses above 32.05 nM have the potential to be harmful in the aquatic ecosystem.