Acyl telluride

Telluroesters (acyl tellurides) have been recognized as excellent sources of acyl radicals upon photolysis with a 250 W tungsten lamp, or thermal process (benzene at reflux) in the... 

These results, which could be supported in terms of homolysis of the Ac-Te bond with capture of the acyl radical by the trapping reagents, have been rationalized, however, on the basis of farther experiments, as a degenerated background reaction in which an acyl radical abstracts an aryltelluro group from an additional molecule of acyl telluride. 

As shown, each of the above-described cyclizations involves an acyltelluride group directly conjugated with an aromatic ring or with an alkene. Noteworthy non-conjugated aliphatic acyl tellurides are unable to be cyclized. 

In a rather more unusual process, presumably involving tellurium-lithium exchange, acyl tellurides may be converted into silyl enol ethers of acyl silanes by treatment with butyl lithium and trimethylchlorosilane. In this procedure it is the Z isomer which is the predominant product (Scheme 24)100. 

Acyl radical sources, other than aldehydes, are also available. The group transfer addition of an acyl radical has been reported by Zard and co-workers, where S-acyl xanthates serve as acyl radical sources [44]. Crich and co-workers reported that an acyl radical, generated from an aromatic acyl telluride by photolysis, adds to an allylic sulfide which contains an ethoxycarbonyl group to form the corre-.sponding y-unsaturated ketones [45]. The addition pathway involves Sh2 type reaction with extrusion of a /ert-butylthiyl radical. 

Crich and coworkers [73] investigated a tellurium atom transfer radical cyclization. Thus, photolysis of the acyl telluride 287 in benzene at 80 °C underwent 1-exo... 

Tellurocarboxylates (RCOTe") are considered to be one of the most fundamental starting compounds for the synthesis of tellurol esters. However, due to their instability, tellurocarboxylates were not described in the literature until the mid-80s. Kato and co-workers synthesized ammonium or potassium tellurocarboxylates by reacting bis(acyl) telluride 88 with primary or secondary amines or potassium ethoxide, and trapped them with methyl iodide, giving rise to tellurol esters (Eq. 59) [114]. 

The aldehyde was then converted to a carboxylic acid via a Pinnick oxidation. Further elaboration to generate acyl telluride 185 was achieved by initial activation of the acid as a mixed anhydride using isobutyl chloro-formate under basic conditions. Nucleophilic displacement with sodium phenyl telluride, generated in situ from borohydride reduction of diphenyl ditelluride, completed the transformation. With acyl telluride 185 in hand, nitrogen deprotection employing TFA, followed by a reductive amination with aldehyde 186 furnished alkyne 187, which was envisioned to be a substrate for radical cyclization (Scheme 19). 

Treatment with water gives the corresponding Z tellurides. Reaction with BuSeBr, iodine and A -bromosuccinimide (NBS) gives respectively Te-Se ketene acetals, a-iodo- and a-bromo vinyl tellurides as mixtures of Z and E stereoisomers (in contrast with the total retention of configuration of the above-discussed Zr/Te exchange reactions). The acylation was effected with acylchlorides in the presence of Cul. ... 

Further evidence for the generation of acyl radicals is the formation of benzaldehyde on photolysis of benzoyl-1-naphthyl telluride in the presence of thiophenol. 

Diaryl tellurides undergo facile ligand-transfer oxidations with [bis(acyl-oxy)iodo]arenes in chloroform to give stable diaryltellurium dicarboxylates 12 (Scheme 7) [23]. Similar ligand-transfer oxidations of triarylbismuthanes and triarylstibanes with BAIB in dichloromethane leading to Bi(V) and Sb(V) diacetates 13 and 14 have also been reported [24,25]. The triarylbismuth diacetates were employed for high yield Cu(II)-catalyzed arylations of a series of aryl-amines [24]. 

The same photolytic treatment of O-acyl esters (2) in the presence of disulfides, diselenides, and ditellurides effectively produces the corresponding alkyl sulfides, alkyl selenides, and alkyl tellurides respectively, through SHi reaction on the chalcogen atoms by alkyl radicals, as shown in eq. 8.9. The reactivities somewhat depend on the kind of chalcogenides. Thus, the effective formation of alkyl sulfides requires 30 eq. of disulfides, that of alkyl selenides requires 10 eq. of diselenides, and that of alkyl tellurides requires 2 eq. of ditellurides [27, 28]. 

For methods to prepare acyl organo tellurium compounds from disodium telluride, carboxylic acid chlorides, and alkyl halides, see p. 500. 

There are several recent methods for the reduction of azobenzene to hydrazobenzene in near-quantitative yield. Samarium(II) iodide reduces azobenzene to hydrazobenzene rapidly at room temperature. Hydrogen telluride, generated in situ from aluminum telluride and water, reduces both azobenzene and azoxybenzene to hydrazobenzene a mixture of phenyllithium and tellurium powder has been used to reduce azobenzene. A complex of the coenzyme dihydrolipoamide and iron(II) is also effective for the reduction of azo- and azoxy-benzene to hydrazobenzene the reduction probably involves coordination of the azobenzene to iron(II) as shown in structure (1). Electrochemical reduction has been used to prepare a number of hydrazobenzenes from the corresponding azobenzenes. In the presence of an acylating agent a diacylhydrazine (e.g. the pyridazinedione derivative 2) can be isolated from the electrochemical reduction of azobenzene. 

Sodium 1-methylethanetellurolate and hexadecanetellurolate were obtained from sodium hydrogen telluride and the appropriate alkyl halide in THF or THF/ethanol. The sodium hydrogen telluride was prepared from tellurium and sodium borohydride in water. Equimolar amounts of disodium telluride combined with aliphatic carboxylic acid chlorides in tetrahydrofuran at — 30" and with aromatic carboxylic acid chlorides in tetrahydrofuran at 0° to give sodium tellurolates that have an acyl group bonded to the tellurium atom. These tellurolates, the sodium salts of tellurolocarboxylic acids, are dark-red substances that were obtained in almost quantitative yields. 

Barton and Crich reported the first examples of the uses of 2-substituted allylic sulfur compounds [53]. Their initial experiments with additions of simple alkyl radicals to allyl sulfides, sulfoxides and sulfones were relatively unsuccessful. This failure was largely due to the fact that the nucleophilic alkyl radicals, which were generated by photolysis of the corresponding Barton ester, underwent addition to a second equivalent of Barton ester faster than they added to the allyl transfer agent. Reactions were much more successful with the electron-deficient acrylate reagent 93 (Fig. 4). Crich was later able to show that this same reagent underwent addition reactions with an acyl radical derived from an acyl phenyl telluride [54]. 

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