Acetic oxide

There are also palladium-catalysed procedures for allylation. Ethyl 3-bromo-l-(4-methylphenylsulfonyl)indole-2-carboxylate is allylated at C3 upon reaction with allyl acetate and hexabutylditin[27], Ihe reaction presumably Involves a ir-allyl-Pd intermediate formed from the allyl acetate, oxidative addition, transmetallation and cross coupling. 

Acetylation of acetaldehyde to ethyUdene diacetate [542-10-9], a precursor of vinyl acetate, has long been known (7), but the condensation of formaldehyde [50-00-0] and acetic acid vapors to furnish acryflc acid [97-10-7] is more recent (30). These reactions consume relatively more energy than other routes for manufacturing vinyl acetate or acryflc acid, and thus are not likely to be further developed. Vapor-phase methanol—methyl acetate oxidation using simultaneous condensation to yield methyl acrylate is still being developed (28). A vanadium—titania phosphate catalyst is employed in that process. 

Enamines via Mercuric Acetate Oxidation of Tertiary Amines. 

Sparteine (43) is oxidized to a mixture of isomers /J -didehydro-sparteine (44) and id -dehydrosparteine (45) (57). The other two stereoisomers of sparteine, a-isosparteine (46) (3S,j9) and S-isosparteine (sparta-lupine) (47) (58,60) have been subjected to mercuric acetate oxidation, each giving Zl -didehydrosparteine (44). 

To return to a more historical development the mercuric acetate oxidation of substituted piperidines (77) should be discussed next. This study established that the normal order of hydrogen removal from the aW-carbon is tertiary —C—H > secondary —C—H > primary —C—H, an observation mentioned earlier in this section. The effect of substitution variations in the piperidine series can be summarized as follow s l-mcthyl-2,6-dialkyl and 1-methyl-2,2,6-trialkyl piperidines, as model systems, are oxidized to the corresponding enamines the 1,2-dialkyl and l-methyl-2,5-dialkyl piperidines are oxidized preferentially at the tertiary a-carbon the 1-methyl-2,3-dialkyl piperidines gave not only the enamines formed by oxidation at the tertiary a-carbon but also hydroxylated enamines as found for 1-methyl-decahydroquinoline (48) (62) l-methyl-2,2,6,6-tctraalkyl piperidines and piperidine are resistant to oxidation by aqueous mercuric acetate and... 

Extension of these studies to medium rings produced interesting results (73). The mercuric acetate oxidation of 1-methyl-1-azacyclooctane (64), when worked up in the usual manner, gave no distillable material. When an equivalent amount of hydrochloric acid was added to the solution which had been saturated with hydrogen sulfide to precipitate the excess mercuric acetate and filtered, evaporation of the solution to dryness gave a solid which was subsequently identified as 2,4,6-tris(6 -methylaminohexyl)-trithiane trihydrochloride (65). Two plausible routes to the observed... 

These experiments verified that cleavage of the C—H bond is occurring in the rate-limiting step, but proof of the necessity of a trans relationship of the C—H to the nitrogen-mereury complex was lacking. Indications that such a relation was necessary are found in studies of the mercuric acetate oxidation of alkaloids, which will be discussed subsequently. 

The results observed in the oxidation of alkaloids which indicated something of the stereochemistry required for oxidation and prompted studies on model systems can now be interpreted more confidently. However, care must be used when basing steric differentiation on mercuric acetate oxidation studies since conditions must be employed which avoid epimerization at carbons alpha to the nitrogen. 

The indole alkaloids of the yohimbine-reserpine series exist in four configurations normal (74), alio (75), pseudo (76), and epiallo (77). The results of the mercuric acetate oxidation of the indole alkaloids are in general... 

Bohlmann and Arndt (S3) have separated the possible stereoisomers of hexahydrojulolidine (78-80) and subjected them to mercuric acetate oxidation. The rates, which were followed by the precipitation of mercurous acetate, showed that isomer 78 reacted about five times faster than isomer 79, while isomer 80 reacted very slowly. The difference in rates between 78 and 79, both of which have tertiary a-hydrogens trans to the nitrogen electron pair, was explained by pointing out that greater relief of non-classical strain occurs in the oxidation of 78 as compared to 79. Isomer 80 has no tertiary a-hydrogens trans to the nitrogen electron pair except when it is in an unfavorable boat conformation. 

A kinetic study of the mercuric acetate oxidation of l-alkyl-3,5-dimethyl-piperidines (81) and 3-alkyl-3-azabicyclo[3.3.1]nonanes (82) was made to evaluate the effect of the N-alkyl group on the rate of oxidation and to contrast these two ring systems (70). The maximum factor in the piperidine... 

The preceding section described the preparation of enamines by mercuric acetate oxidation of tertiary amines. The initial product in these oxidations is the ternary iminium salt, which is converted to the enamine or mixture of enamines by reaetion with base. Thus iminium salts synthesized by methods other than the oxidation of tertiary amines or the protonation of enamines are potential enamine sources. 

The lithium- -propylamine reducing system has been found capable of reducing julolidine (113) to /d -tetrahydrojulolidine (114, 66% yield) and 1-methyl-1,2,3,4-tctrahydroquinoline to a mixture of enamines (87% yield), l-methyl-J -octahydroquinoline (115) and 1-methyl-al -octahydro-quinoline (116) 102). This route to enamines of bicyclic and tricyclic systems avoids hydroxylation, which occurs during mercuric acetate oxidation of certain bicyclic and tricyclic tertiary amines 62,85 see Section III.A). 

The previous sections have dealt with stable C=N-I- functionality in aromatic rings as simple salts. Another class of iminium salt reactions can be found where the iminium salt is only an intermediate. The purpose of this section is to point out these reactions even though they do not show any striking differences in their reactivity from stable iminium salts. Such intermediates arise from a-chloroamines (133-135), isomerization of oxazolidines (136), reduction of a-aminoketones by the Clemmensen method (137-139), reductive alkylation by the Leuckart-Wallach (140-141) or Clarke-Eschweiler reaction (142), mercuric acetate oxidation of amines (46,93), and in reactions such as ketene with enamines (143). 

Another iminium intermediate that has been proposed is in the mercuric acetate oxidation of amines (46,9J). This reaction is discussed in the... 

Enamines derived from 1-azabicycloalkanes, readily accessible by mercuric acetate oxidation of saturated bases (112), have been extensively studied recently (113-115). Since an immonium salt is formed during dehydrogenation, the composition of the liberated enamine mixture shows the relative stability of the various possible isomers. The study of infrared and NMR spectra has shown that the position of the enamine double bond is determined by factors similar to those determining the relative stability of simple olefins. 

The formation of an enamine from an a,a-disubstituted cyclopentanone and its reaction with methyl acrylate was used in a synthesis of clovene (JOS). In a synthetic route to aspidospermine, a cyclic enamine reacted with methyl acrylate to form an imonium salt, which regenerated a new cyclic enamine and allowed a subsequent internal enamine acylation reaction (309,310). The required cyclic enamine could not be obtained in this instance by base isomerization of the allylic amine precursor, but was obtained by mercuric acetate oxidation of its reduction product. Condensation of a dihydronaphthalene carboxylic ester with an enamine has also been reported (311). 

Those epimers of 1,2,3,4-tetrahydro-j8-carbolines of general structure 139, in which the hydrogen on carbon-1 of the carboline moiety is axial, are converted into the corresponding 3,4-dihydro- -carbolinium salts (141) by mercuric acetate oxidation. Sodium dichromate... 

Even with the highly reactive dienophile cyclohepta-2,6-dien-4-ynone, generated from 1-aminocycloheptatriazol-6-(1 H)-one by lead(IV) acetate oxidation, only the adduct of benzene oxide 3 can be isolated.231... 

Such a pre-equilibrium closely parallels that suggested by Dewar et for the manganic acetate oxidations of several aromatic ethers and amines (p. 405). Other features of the reaction are a p value of —0.7 and identical activation energies of 25.3 kcal.mole for oxidation of toluene, ethylbenzene, cumene, diphenylmethane and triphenylmethane. 

Acetate may also be converted into methane by a few methanogens belonging to the genus Meth-anosarcina. The methyl group is initially converted into methyltetrahydromethanopterin (corresponding to methyltetrahydrofolate in the acetate oxidations discussed above) before reduction to methane via methyl-coenzyme M the carbonyl group of acetate is oxidized via bound CO to CO2. 

Pfennig N, H Biebl (1976) Desulfuromonas acetoxidans gen. nov. and sp. nov., a new anaerobic, sulfur-reducing, acetate-oxidizing Arch Microbiol 110 3-12. 

Widdel F (1987) New types of acetate-oxidizing, sulfate-reducing Desulfobacter species, D. hydrogenophilus sp. nov., D. latus sp. nov., and D. curvatus sp. nov. Arch Microbiol 148 286-291. 

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