Hyodeoxycholic Acid - Applications

Applications

It was known since 1939 that HDCA could be used to synthesize progesterone. A decade later, an analysis of the composition of hog bile determined that HDCA accounted for approximately 40% of its acid contents. In the 1950s, lacking access to vegetal precursors of steroids, like diosgenin, the East German company Jenapharm used hyodeoxycholic acid extracted from hog bile as the sole precursor for steroid synthesis.

In the 1980s, hyodeoxycholic acid was investigated for its propensity to prevent cholesterol-induced gallstones in animals fed with a lithogenic diet. Another animal study determined that oral administration of HDCA leads to a decrease in LDL-cholesterol concentration, a strong stimulation of hepatic cholesterol biosynthesis and an excessive loss of cholesterol in feces. Unlike ursodeoxycholic acid, which is an approved drug for the treatment of gallstones, HDCA is not marketed for any medical condition.

In supramolecular chemistry a molecular tweezer based on a hyodeoxycholic acid showed a high selectivity the towards the fluorine radical.