Synthesis of the Tripeptide Antibiotic Resormycin

A short and efficient synthesis of resormycin, a metabolite of Streptomyces platensis MJ953-SF5 with herbicidal and antifungal activity, is described. The key step in our synthetic approach is a late-stage stereospecific dehydration of a beta-hydroxy amino acid to install the Z-olefin. Because of the modular nature of the synthesis, access to analogues for biological evaluation is readily available.