Abstract
Compounds like biphenyl, diphenyl sulfide, diphenyl disulfide, diphenyl trisulfide, which do not have steroidal skeleton, possess estrogen-like activity. Of the compounds with phenyl bonded to sulfur atom, those having the most suitable distance (8.55Å) between two radicals in the molecule, i.e. disulfide compounds, showed the strongest estrogen-like activity. Position of the substituent on the ring had little effect on the potency, while OH group increased such activity. The activity seemed to be weakened by the effect of a substituent in the order of Cl, Br, I>NO2>COOH>CH3. Some of the diphenyl disulfide derivatives used in the present experiments were obtained by reduction of benzenesulfonyl derivatives with red phosphorus and hydrobromic acid, a modification of Kawahara's method using red phosphorus and iodine.
