Alkenes oxidative acetoxylations

The maintenance of a supported liquid layer in gas-phase reactions is also important in other heterogeneous catalytic applications, such as the Bayer/Hoechst process for vinyl acetate manufacture. However, in these systems, the catalytic metal is reduced to the metallic state, leading to significant mechanistic differences from the formally related homogeneous Wacker-type alkene oxidation/acetoxylation processes (section 11.7.7.3). 

Scheme 14 Possible outcomes for the palladium-catalyzed oxidative acetoxylation of alkenes...

The oxidation of 1-alkenes usually gives 2-acetoxy-l-alkenes.571,572 Oxidative acetoxylation of propylene with Pd(OAc)2 may yield allylic or vinylic acetates depending on reaction conditions573 (see Section 9.2.6). 

The in situ regeneration of Pd(II) from Pd(0) should not be counted as being an easy process, and the appropriate solvents, reaction conditions, and oxidants should be selected to carry out smooth catalytic reactions. In many cases, an efficient catalytic cycle is not easy to achieve, and stoichiometric reactions are tolerable only for the synthesis of rather expensive organic compounds in limited quantities. This is a serious limitation of synthetic applications of oxidation reactions involving Pd(II). However it should be pointed out that some Pd(II)-promoted reactions have been developed as commercial processes, in which supported Pd catalysts are used. For example, vinyl acetate, allyl acetate and 1,4-diacetoxy-2-butene are commercially produced by oxidative acetoxylation of ethylene, propylene and butadiene in gas or liquid phases using Pd supported on silica. It is likely that Pd(OAc)2 is generated on the surface of the catalyst by the oxidation of Pd with AcOH and 02, and reacts with alkenes. 

Oxidative acetoxylation provides a direct access from alkenes to alkenyl esters the alkene molecule undergoes replacement of an H atom by an acetate (or generally OCOR) group in its vinylic (v), allylic (a), or homoallylic (h) position according to Scheme 1, where Ox is an oxidant such as O2, Cu p-benzoquinone, and Red a reduced form of Ox such as H2O, Cu hydroquinone. A typical example is the Pd-catalyzed co-oxidation of ethylene and acetic acid to vinyl acetate (eq. (D). 

When Pd compounds (PdfOAc) ", Pd2(OAc)i , or Pd3(OAc)e) are used as starting material, even small additions of water (1-3%) to the NaOAc/AcOH solvent give rise to a great deal of acetaldehyde instead of vinyl acetate [11-13]. In contrast to this, the Pd metal catalysts (e. g., supported Pd or Pd black, prepared by H2 reduction of Pd" complexes in combination with NaOAc) provide vinyl ester from alkene and AcOH with high selectivity, regardless of the water content up to 10% [11, 14, 15]. Further differences in the selectivity of reaction (1) with Pd" and Pd° catalysts were found for the oxidative acetoxylation of higher alkenes, viz., propylene, 1-hexene, and cyclohexene [7]. All these facts apparently implied that the alkene activation came from two different origins one from Pd" and another from Pd metal or, more exactly, low-valent Pd clusters formed upon Pd" reduction with H2. 

The outer-sphere OAc anions can be replaced by other anions. For instance, the and PF anions readily substitute for OAc anions in an aqueous solution containing KPFft, affording the giant cluster with the idealized formula [Pdsei LeoOeoKPFeleo [Ik 16, 17]. The Pd-561 clusters exhibit a high catalytic activity in alkene acetoxylation in an AcOH solution under mild conditions (20-60 °C at 0.1 MPa). Besides reaction (1), the clusters provide the oxidative acetoxylation of propylene to allyl acetate (eq. (6)) or of toluene to benzyl acetate (eq. (7)). 

The Michaelis-Menten character of the kinetics suggests that the formation of the reaction product is preceded by reversible coordination of the alkene, O2, and AcOH molecules by the cluster. The kinetic isotope effects give evidence that the mechanisms of oxidative acetoxylation (eq. (1)) catalyzed with Pd and low-valence Pd clusters are different. On the basis of kinetic data, including the H/D kinetic isotope effects [9], the reaction mechanism represented by Scheme 6 has been proposed for Pd-561-catalyzed reaction. 

Nitrogen oxide (NO, ) cocatalysts [120] have received industrial interest in Pd-catalyzed aerobic oxidations such as oxidative carbonylation (see Section 8.2.2) [18], alkene oxidation [121], and arene acetoxylation [55]. Recent studies from academic literature have provided new insights into the roles of NO in these reactions. Pd-catalyzed aerobic alkene oxidation (Wacker reaction) typically affords methyl ketones arising from Markovnikov addition of water (or hydroxide) to an... 

Three oxidative reactions of benzene with Pd(OAc)2 via reactive rr-aryl-Pd complexes are known. The insertion of alkenes and elimination afford arylalk-enes. The oxidative functionalization of alkenes with aromatics is treated in Section 2.8. Two other reactions, oxidative homocoupling[324,325] and the acetoxylation[326], are treated in this section. The palladation of aromatic compounds is possible only with Pd(OAc)2. No reaction takes place with PdCl2. 

The anodic oxidation of 4-methoxyphcnols in acetic acid effectively stabilises the phenoxonium ion, in an equlibrium with the acetoxylation product. Tbis allows an intermolecular [5 + 2] bx-cycloaddition processes with some alkenes [110], The cycloaddition process has been used very successfully in the synthesis of a number of natural products [III]. The rate of cycloaddition is sensitive to substituents on the alkene bond and in imfavourable cases other reactions of the phenoxonium ion predominate. 

In 1960, Moiseev and coworkers reported that benzoquinone (BQ) serves as an effective stoichiometric oxidant in the Pd-catalyzed acetoxylation of ethylene (Eq. 2) [19,20]. This result coincided with the independent development of the Wacker process (Eq. 1, Scheme 1) [Ij. Subsequently, BQ was found to be effective in a wide range of Pd-catalyzed oxidation reactions. Eor example, BQ was used to achieve Wacker-type oxidation of terminal alkenes to methyl ketones in aqueous DMF (Eq. 3 [21]), dehydrogenation of cyclohexanone (Eq. 4 [22]), and alcohol oxidation (Eq. 5 [23]). In the final example, 1,4-naphthoquinone (NQ) was used as the stoichiometric oxidant. 

These multicomponent catalyst systems have been employed in a variety of aerobic oxidation reactions [27]. For example, use of the Co(salophen) cocatalyst, 1, enables selective allylic acetoxylation of cyclic alkenes (Eq. 6). Cyclo-hexadiene undergoes diacetoxylation under mild conditions with Co(TPP), 2 (Eq. 7), and terminal alkenes are oxidized to the corresponding methyl ketones with Fe(Pc), 3, as the cocatalyst (Eq. 8). 

Palladium-catalyzed addition of oxygen nucleophiles to alkenes dates back to the Wacker process and acetoxylation of ethylene (Sects. 1 and 2). In contrast, catalytic methods for intermolecular oxidative amination of alkenes (i.e., aza-Wacker reactions) have been identified only recently. Both O2 and BQ have been used as oxidants in these reactions. 

The mechanistic role of BQ in the allylic acetoxylation of alkenes suggests that it may not be possible to achieve direct dioxygen-coupled turnover. Recently, however, Kaneda and coworkers reported BQ-free conditions for aerobic allylic acetoxylation that feature a solvent mixture of acetic acid and M,M-dimethylacetamide (DMA) and O2 as the sole oxidant for the Pd catalyst (Eq. 55) [209]. The reactions are highly selective for C-1 acetoxylation (C-1 C-3 = 7-45 1). High pressures of O2 (6 atm) are required to achieve these results. 

Alkenes can be transformed to carbonyl compounds through the oxidation of the vinylic carbon atom. A special case of vinylic oxidation is acetoxylation of alkenes and dienes. 

Pd(H) complexes with strongly electron-withdrawing ligands can insert into the allylic C—H bond (path c) to form directly the Jt-allyl complex via oxidative addi-tion.502,694,697 Pd(OOCCF3)2 in acetic acid, for example, ensures high yields of allylic acetoxylated products.698 The delicate balance between allylic and vinylic acetoxylation was observed to depend on substrate structure, too. For simple terminal alkenes the latter process seems to be the predominant pathway.571... 

In fact, the role of copper and oxygen in the Wacker Process is certainly more complicated than indicated in equations (151) and (152) and in Scheme 10, and could be similar to that previously discussed for the rhodium/copper-catalyzed ketonization of terminal alkenes. Hosokawa and coworkers have recently studied the Wacker-type asymmetric intramolecular oxidative cyclization of irons-2-(2-butenyl)phenol (132) by 02 in the presence of (+)-(3,2,10-i -pinene)palladium(II) acetate (133) and Cu(OAc)2 (equation 156).413 It has been shown that the chiral pinanyl ligand is retained by palladium throughout the reaction, and therefore it is suggested that the active catalyst consists of copper and palladium linked by an acetate bridge. The role of copper would be to act as an oxygen carrier capable of rapidly reoxidizing palladium hydride into a hydroperoxide species (equation 157).413 Such a process is also likely to occur in the palladium-catalyzed acetoxylation of alkenes (see Section 61.3.4.3). 

In contrast to ethylene, which gives only vinylic or oxidative addition products, the acetoxylation of higher alkenes results in the formation of a mixture of allylic and vinylic acetates.367 The... 

Allylic acetoxylation.1 The combination of r-butyl hydroperoxide and Se02 has been used for allylic hydroxylation of alkenes (8, 64-65), but this system is not useful for oxidation of cycloalkenes. Allylic acetoxylation of cycloalkcnes is possible, but in modest yield, with PdCl2 and AgOAc, which probably form a reactive species such as [PdCl(OAc)] . This system can be used in catalytic amounts in the presence of t-butyl hydroperoxide for a reoxidation step. The yield is improved by addition of TcO, which seems to accelerate the oxidation. The most satisfactory ratios of... 

A variety of alkylbenzenes undergo anodic acetoxylation, in which the loss of an a proton and solvation of the radical cation intermediate form the basis of side-chain and nuclear acetoxylation, respectively.30Sa b The nucleophilicity of the solvent can be diminished by replacing acetic acid with TFA. The attendant increase in the lifetimes of aromatic radical cations has been illustrated in anodic oxidations.308 Radical cations also appear to be intermediates in the electrochemical oxidation of alkanes and alkenes.309a-c... 

Other transition metal salts mediate in similar oxidations. For example, mercury(II) acetate, a milder reagent than LTA, effects a-acetoxylation through a comparable mechanism. However the corresponding yields for these processes are poor. 3,3-Dimethylcyclohexanone, for example, is oxidized to the a-acetoxy derivative in only 14% yield.The, 7-unsaturated ketone, isopugelone, exhibits no oxidation at the a- or a -positions, but affords a product derived from isomerization of the alkene and allylic oxidation. Not surprisingly therefore the reagent has found little synthetic application for this transformation. 

Some other reactions involving oxidation of the C—Hg bond have been known for some time, but these are either of limited synthetic appeal or have experienced no significant development in recent years. Thus ozonolysis of the C—Hg bond to form carboxylic acids or ketones falls into the first category, whereas allylic acetoxylation of alkenes by Hg(OAc>2 falls into the second category. Nevertheless, this allylic oxidation (Treibe s reaction) has considerable synthetic utility, and has been reviewed quite recently.5 ... 

Thallium triacetate, TI(0C0CH3)3 1.5H20 (mp 182 C), like the monoacetate, is used for the stereoselective acetoxylation of alkenes [411] and for oxidations of alkenes to epoxides [412]. 

Heating alkenes and cycloalkenes with manganese triacetate yields lactones resulting from an oxidative addition of acetoxyls across the double bonds (equation 88) [50J]. 

Acetoxylation of alkenes takes place in allylic position [40,115], concurrent with addition of acetoxy groups across the double bond or double-bond system. The mechanism is almost certainly analogous to that discussed previously for methoxylation [Eq. (20)]. Because AcO is difficult to oxidize, the anodic discharge of simple, unactivated alkenes may be achieved in its presence. Subsequent reactions of the cationic intermediates are not very selective, but several experimental parameters may be controlled and the method can compare well with the few competing chemical methods. 

---