The present invention provides the synthesis of diuridine tetraphosphate tetrasodium salt via the tetraammonium salt. In this process, uridine 5′-diphosphate disodium salt is first converted to the tributylammonium salt using a sulfonic acid resin to generate UDP as the free acid, followed by salt formation with excess tributylamine. After isolation by evaporative water removal, the anhydrous UDP tributylammonium salt is activated with 1,1-carbonyldiimidazole in DMF solution, during which time coupling to form U2P4 also occurs. Concentration of the solution in vacuo, followed by ion-exchange chromatography on Sephadex DEAE-A25 using an increasing gradient of aqueous ammonium bicarbonate yielded a solution of pure diuridine tetraphosphate in ammonium bicarbonate buffer. The volatile buffer is removed by repeated evaporation with water on a rotary evaporator to generate the tetraammonium salt of U2P4 as oil. The oil is dissolved in deionized water to give a ca. 10% solution, and this solution is charged to a Dowex 50Wx4 Na+ (Dow) column and eluted with deionized water. The fractions containing U2P4 are pooled, concentrated and lyophilized to yield U2P4 tetrasodium salt as a white solid.
