Alcohol, chiral building blocks

Even if hundreds of chiral catalysts have been developed to promote the enantioselective addition of alkylzinc reagents to aldehydes with enantioselectivities over 90% ee, the addition of organozinc reagents to aldehydes is not a solved problem. For example, only very few studies on the addition of vinyl groups or acetylides and even arylzinc reagents to aldehydes have been published, in spite of the fact that the products of these reactions, chiral allylic, propargylic and aryl alcohols, are valuable chiral building blocks. 

Diastereoselective allylation under aqueous Barbier conditions of a-amino aldehydes with the chiral building block (Ss)-3-chloro-2-(p-tolylsulfinyl)-l-propene to give enantiomerically pure sulfinyl amino alcohols in good yields and with high diastereoselectivity was reported (Eq. 8.34).73... 

The reduction of nitro ketones with baker s yeast is a good method for the preparation of chiral nitro alcohols.89 The reduction of 5-nitro-2-pentanone with baker s yeast gives the corresponding (5)-alcohol, which is an important chiral building block. Various chiral natural products are prepared from it. In Scheme 7.16, the synthesis of the pheromone of Andrena haemorrhoa is described, where the acylation of the chiral nitro alcohol followed by radical denitration is involved as key steps.89a... 

Similarly, whole-cell Lactobacillus kefir DSM 20587, which possesses two alcohol dehydrogenases for both asymmetric reduction steps, was applied in the reduction of tert-butyl 6-chloro-3,5-dioxohexanoate for asymmetric synthesis of ft rf-butyl-(31 ,5S)-6-chloro-dihydroxyhexanoate (Figure 7.5), a chiral building block for the HMG-CoA reductase inhibitor [ 17]. A final product concentration of 120 him and a specific product capacity of 2.4 mmol per gram dry cell were achieved in an optimized fed-batch process. Ado 99% was obtained for (3R,5S)- and (3.S, 55)-te/ f-butyl-6-chloro-dihydroxyhexanoate with the space-time yield being 4.7 mmolL-1 h-1. 

Two interesting yeast carbonyl reductases, one from Candida magnoliae (CMCR) [33,54] and the other from Sporobolomyces salmonicolor (SSCR) [55], were found to catalyze the reduction of ethyl 4-chloro-3-oxobutanoate to give ethyl (5)-4-chloro-3-hydroxybutanoate, a useful chiral building block. In an effort to search for carbonyl reductases with anti-Prelog enantioselectivity, the activity and enantioselectivity of CMCR and SSCR have been evaluated toward the reduction of various ketones, including a- and /3-ketoesters, and their application potential in the synthesis of pharmaceutically important chiral alcohol intermediates have been explored [56-58]. 

The optically active isoxazolidines obtained in these cycloaddition reactions can be easily transformed into biologically active 3 -amino acids, into j3-lactams and into important chiral building blocks such as y-amino alcohols. The multitude of synthetic results in these reactions is of course expected by the wide variety... 

Treating benzaldehyde with diethylzinc in the presence of 2 mol% (—)-DAIB gives (5)-alcohol in 98% ee (Scheme 2-43). When compound 112 is treated in the same manner, compound 113, a chiral building block in the three-component coupling prostaglandin synthesis, is also obtained with high ee (Scheme 2-43). 

Figure 5.21 Cyanohydrins are precursors for hydroxyamino acids, amino acids and amino alcohols. New sol-gel CACHy catalysts convert aldehydes and ketones into such valued chiral building blocks. (Reproduced from Avecia.com, with permission.)...

Enzymatic reduction of carbonyl compounds and enzymatic enantioselective transformation of racemic or meso alcohols (25,43.) are two methodologies that have proven to be beneficial in the preparation of optically active hydroxyl compounds, key chiral building blocks used in carbohydrate and natural product syntheses (44-45. Our interest in this area is to develop enzymatic routes to optically active glycerol and furan derivatives, and hydroxyaldehydes. 

The asymmetric catalytic nitroaldol reaction, also known as the asymmetric Henry reaction, is another example of an aldol-related synthesis of high general interest. In this reaction nitromethane (or a related nitroalkane) reacts in the presence of a chiral catalyst with an aldehyde, forming optically active / -nitro alcohols [122], The / -nitro alcohols are valuable intermediates in the synthesis of a broad variety of chiral building blocks, e.g. / -amino alcohols. A highly efficient asymmetric catalytic nitroaldol reaction has been developed by the Shibasaki group, who used multifunctional lanthanoid-based complexes as chiral catalysts [122-125],... 

Aldehyde reductase of S. salmonicolor can catalyze the asymmetric reduction of 4-haloacetoacetate esters to the corresponding (-R)-alcohols, which are promising chiral building blocks for the preparation of a variety of optically active compounds such as L-carnitine [119] (Fig. 9). 

Amino aldehydes provide useful starting materials for the sequence of Scheme 11.3 because they can easily be prepared from a-amino acids in enantiomerically pure forms and are, therefore, useful chiral building blocks.18 The addition of organometallic allylic reagents (including Zn, used in the reaction described) to such compounds can produce homoallylic alcohols 13 with a high anh-diastereoselectivity. 

Enantiomerically enriched a-hydroxy acetals are interesting synthons and can be transformed to a variety of chiral building blocks such as 1,2-diols, a-hydroxy acids, or 1,2-amino alcohols (Scheme 18.4). Whereas the oxidation to (f )-ethyl lactate was rather difficult and required the protection of the OH group, the reduction could be easily accomplished after hydrolysis of the acetal. No significant racemization was observed. With a boronic acid derivative and a secondary amine as described by Petasis and Zavialov,24 it was also possible to synthesize an amino alcohol with high diastereoselectivity. 

The synthetic application of the a-chloro aldehydes has been demonstrated by the preparation of a variety of important chiral building blocks (Scheme 2.35) [26b]. The a-chloro aldehydes could be reduced to the corresponding optically active a-chloro alcohols in more than 90% yield, maintaining the enantiomeric excess by using NaBFU. It was also shown that optically active 2-aminobutanol - a key intermediate in the synthesis of the tuberculostatic, ethambutol - could be obtained in high yields by standard transformations from 2-chlorobutanol. Furthermore, the synthesis of an optically active terminal epoxide was demonstrated. The 2-chloro aldehydes could also be oxidized to a-chloro carboxylic acids in high yields without loss of optical purity, and further transformations were also presented. 

The chiral building block of type II was synthesized as follows. Reduction of 4, prepared in Scheme 2, with NaBf CN in the presence of trifluoroacetic acid provided a 14 1 mixture of trans-(2,6)- and cis-(2,6)-piperidines. Because it was difficult to isolate the major, desired trans-isomer in a pure state, the epimeric mixture was used for subsequent transformation. Hydrogenation of the mixture over Pd(OH)2 followed by treatment of the resulting amine with ClCC Me gave diastereopure trans-piperidine in 68% isolated yield, which was transformed into the alcohol 6 in 92% yield. 

Chiral alcohols are some of the most important chiral building blocks for the production of pharmaceuticals. The creation of chiral alcohols through the asymmetric reduction of prochiral carbonyl compounds using biocatalysts, such as microbial cells and commercially available oxidoreductases, has been... 

Ot-Hydroxy Acid and Epoxide as Building Blocks. Deamination of an a-amino acid with nitrous acid is known to give the corresponding a-hydroxy acid with retention of configuration. An a-hydroxy acid can be converted to an epoxide. Both a-hydroxy acids and epoxides are versatile chiral building blocks in natural products syntheses (3). Alcohol as a Chiral Building Block... 

Chiral alcohols are useful starting materials for the synthesis of various biologically active compounds. The need for enantiomerically pure drugs and agrochemicals has increased in recent years [13]. Derivatives of enantiopure 1-phenylethanol are important chiral building blocks, which can be used as synthetic intermediates for the production of pharmaceuticals, fine-chemicals agrochemicals, and natural products. In particular (R)-1-phenylethanol is in widespread use as an ophthalmic preservative, an inhibitor of cholesterol intestinal adsorption, a solvatochromic dye, a fragrance, and so on. 

The wide variety of known oxidases reflects the complexities of the different substrate classes such as carbohydrates, amino acids, lipids, amines, metabolites, alcohols, acids, and other chiral building blocks. An overview of synthetic applications of oxidases is given in Figure 20.3. 

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