Acetylene faciality

The cycloadditions of the C-2 vinyl glicals with maleic anhydride are an interesting example of facial stereocontrol. The allylic methoxy group in dienes 55a and 55b exerts an nnh -stereodirecting effect as shown by the stereochemistry of the endo-cycloadducts 56 and 57 obtained as the sole products from 55a and 55b, respectively, and by the fact that 55c produces [51] a mixture of the diastereoisomers 56c and 57c (Scheme 2.22). When linear acetylenic dienophiles were used, the degree of facial diastereoselectivity decreased, which indicates its dependence on steric effects. 

An enantioselective intramolecular Pauson-Khand reaction based on chiral auxiliary-directed 7t-face discrimination in acetylenic 0-alkyl enol ether-dicobalt hexacarbonyl complexes, which proceeds with good yields and high facial diastereoselectivity, has recently been developed by M.A. Pericas, A. Moyano, A.E. Greene and their associates. The method has been applied to an enantioselective formal synthesis of hirsutene. Moreover, the process is stereodivergent and the chiral auxiliary -rran5-2-phenylcyclohexanol- is recovered in a yield as high as 92% [18]. 

Tazarotene (Tazorac) is an acetylenic retinoid that is available as a 0.1% gel and cream for the treatment of mild to moderately severe facial acne. Topical tazarotene should be used by women of childbearing age only after contraceptive counseling. It is recommended that tazarotene should not be used by pregnant women. 

Some four-electron capping units enter as such. This is the case for the many reactions forming/t3-sulfur ligands from elemental sulfur (103). It also holds for the triruthenium /i3-nitrene cluster 45, formed from Me3SiN3 and Ru3(CO)i2 (104). A versatile four-electron ligand is the acetylene moiety, which can add facially to M3 units as a two-center capping group, as found in the clusters 46, which can be obtained from trinuclear carbonyls of iron, ruthenium, and osmium (105, 106). 

In line with van t Hoff s stereochemistry and the orientation of elliptic orbits, covalent bonds could be represented by tetrahedra that touch in apical, edgewise and facial mode, involving one, two or three electron pairs in an interaction, also shown in Fig. 2. This theory predicts increased bond strength with increasing bond order, but fails to account quantitatively for observed internuclear distances. For example, this model predicts the interatomic distances in methane and acetylene in the ratio of 3 1. 

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