Wacker oxidation addition reactions

In the sixth chapter the activation of O-H bonds of water, alcohols and carboxylic acids, and their addition to multiple bonds is reported. Since the formally oxidative addition of ROH gives rise to hydrido(hydroxo) complexes, [MH(OR)Ln] which are postulated as intermediates in many important reactions (water gas shift reaction, Wacker-chemistry, catalytic transfer hydrogenations etc.) the authors of this chapter,... 

Textbook chemistry (297,298) teaches that palladium is the preferred catalyst for aerobic oxidation of olefins. When water is the solvent, nucleophilic water addition to coordinated olefins is the key step in the so-called Wacker cycle. Wacker oxidation occurs regiospecifically because a carbonyl group is formed at that carbon atom of the double bond where the nucleophile in a Markovnikov-like addition would enter. The Wacker reaction thus yields methylketones from primary alkenes ... 

J. Tsuji, Addition Reactions with Formation of Carbon-Oxygen Bonds - The Wacker Oxidation and Related Reactions, in Comprehensive Organic Synthesis (B. M. Trost, I. Fleming, Eds.), Vol. 7, 469, Pergamon Press, Oxford, U. K., 1991. 

The point has been made that the conditions of p-chloroethanol formation are not the same as used for the Wacker oxidation. Cu Pd chlorine-bridged dimers are likely reactants under higher [Cl ] reaction conditions, which may lead to a different reaction mechanism. However, a second stereochemical study also obtained results consistent with trans hydroxypaUadation. When cfr-l,2-dideuteroethene is oxidized in water with PdCl2 under a CO atmosphere, the product is tran5 -2,3-dideutero-jS-propiolactone (Scheme 37). The reaction conditions were, once again, not identical with standard Wacker process conditions, since the solvent was acetonitrile water, the temperature was —25°C, the bis-ethene PdCl2 complex was used, and there was no excess Cl present. Nevertheless, it is clear that, under many reaction conditions, a trans addition of water onto ethene coordinated to Pd is the favored reaction stereochemistry. 

Long-chain aliphatic olefins give only insufficient conversion to the acids due to low solubility and isomerization side reactions. In order to overcome these problems the effect of co-solvents and chemically modified /i-cyclodextrins as additives was investigated for the hydrocarboxylation of 1-decene [23], Without such a promoter, conversion and acid selectivity are low, 10% and 20% respectively. Addition of co-solvents significantly increases conversion, but does not reduce the isomerization. In contrast, the addition of dimethyl-/i-cyclodextrin increased conversion and induced 90% selectivity toward the acids. This effect is rationalized by a host/ guest complex of the cyclic carbohydrate and the olefin which prevents isomerization of the double bond. This pronounced chemoselectivity effect of cyclodextrins is also observed in the hydroformylation and the Wacker oxidation of water-insoluble olefins [24, 25]. More recent studies of the biphasic hydrocarboxylation include the reaction of vinyl aromatic compounds to the isomeric arylpropanoic acids [29, 30], and of small, sparingly water-soluble alkenes such as propene [31]. 

For practical purposes, most organic chemists mean by oxidation either addition of oxygen to the substrate (such as epoxidation of an alkene), removal of hydrogen (such as the conversion of an alcohol to an aldehyde or ketone), or removal of one electron (such as the conversion of phenoxide anion to the phenoxy radical). Examples of oxidation reactions of alkenes have been described in Chapter 5, including epoxidation, aziridination, dihydroxylation and Wacker oxidation. This chapter therefore concentrates on oxidations of hydrocarbons, alcohols and ketones. 

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