Alkynes carbene insertion

Donor-substituted alkynes can insert into the C-M double bond of alkoxycarbene complexes, yielding donor-substituted vinylcarbene complexes [191,192]. In addition to this, photolysis or thermolysis of a-alkoxycyclopropyl carbonyl complexes or a-alkoxycyclobutanoyl complexes can lead to rearrangement to metallacyclic carbene complexes (Table 2.11). This methodology has not been used as extensively for the preparation of carbene complexes as the other methods described above. 

Reactions of alkynyliodonium salts 119 with nucleophiles proceed via an addition-elimination mechanism involving alkylidenecarbenes 120 as key intermediates. Depending on the structure of the alkynyliodonium salt, specific reaction conditions, and the nucleophile employed, this process can lead to a substituted alkyne 121 due to the carbene rearrangement, or to a cyclic product 122 via intramolecular 1,5-carbene insertion (Scheme 50). Both of these reaction pathways have been widely utilized as a synthetic tool for the formation of new C-C bonds. In addition, the transition metal mediated cross-coupling reactions of alkynyliodonium salts are increasingly used in organic synthesis. 

In connection with the synthesis of pyrrolo[l,2-a]indoles, intramolecular carbene insertion reactions have been developed. Although strictly involving interactions between two substituents, they will be considered here because of their chemical similarity. Thermal decomposition of the sodium salt of the tosylhydrazone (219) gives intramolecular cycloaddition followed by loss of nitrogen to yield the fused indole (220) (Equation (66)) <89JCS(Pi)2449>. This technique can be extended to include oxime ethers (221) in place of alkenes and thus provide formation of an aziridine (222) insertion into alkynes could not be achieved (Equation (67)) <9iJCS(Pi)i72i>. 

By a photochemically induced elimination of CO, a chromium carbene complex with a free coordination site is generated. That species can coordinate to an alkyne, to give the alkyne-chromium carbonyl complex 4. The next step is likely to be a cycloaddition reaction leading to a four-membered ring compound 5. A subsequent electrocyclic ring opening and the insertion of CO leads to the vinylketene complex 6 ... 

In 1986 Yamashida et al. found that the reaction of the (morpholino)phenyl-carbene complex 46 with symmetric alkynes 47 gave the morpholinylindene derivatives 48 and 49, as well as the indanones 50 derived from the latter by hydrolysis, in excellent yields (Scheme 9) [54]. This contrasts with the behavior of the corresponding (methoxy)phenylcarbene complex, which solely undergoes the Dotz reaction [55]. This transformation of the amino-substituted complex 46 apparently does not involve a CO insertion, which is an important feature of the Dotz benzannelation. 

Recently, Aumann et al. reported that rhodium catalysts enhance the reactivity of 3-dialkylamino-substituted Fischer carbene complexes 72 to undergo insertion with enynes 73 and subsequent formation of 4-alkenyl-substituted 5-dialkylamino-2-ethoxycyclopentadienes 75 via the transmetallated carbene intermediate 74 (Scheme 15, Table 2) [73]. It is not obvious whether this transformation is also applicable to complexes of type 72 with substituents other than phenyl in the 3-position. One alkyne 73, with a methoxymethyl group instead of the alkenyl or phenyl, i.e., propargyl methyl ether, was also successfully applied [73]. 

Scheme 15 Formation of 4-alkenyl(phenyl)-substituted 5-dialkylamino-2-ethoxycyclopen-tadienes 75 via transmetallated alkyne-inserted rhodium-carbene complexes 74 [73]. For further details see Table 2...

The novel highly substituted spiro[4.4]nonatrienes 98 and 99 are produced by a [3+2+2+2] cocyclization with participation of three alkyne molecules and the (2 -dimethylamino-2 -trimethylsilyl)ethenylcarbene complex 96 (Scheme 20). This transformation is the first one ever observed involving threefold insertion of an alkyne and was first reported in 1999 by de Meijere et al. [81]. The structure of the product was eventually determined by X-ray crystal structure analysis of the quaternary ammonium iodide prepared from the regioisomer 98 (Ar=Ph) with methyl iodide. Interestingly, these formal [3+2+2+2] cycloaddition products are formed only from terminal arylacetylenes. In a control experiment with the complex 96 13C-labeled at the carbene carbon, the 13C label was found only at the spiro carbon atom of the products 98 and 99 [42]. 

The insertion of alkynes into a chromium-carbon double bond is not restricted to Fischer alkenylcarbene complexes. Numerous transformations of this kind have been performed with simple alkylcarbene complexes, from which unstable a,/J-unsaturated carbene complexes were formed in situ, and in turn underwent further reactions in several different ways. For example, reaction of the 1-me-thoxyethylidene complex 6a with the conjugated enyne-ketimines and -ketones 131 afforded pyrrole [92] and furan 134 derivatives [93], respectively. The alkyne-inserted intermediate 132 apparently undergoes 671-electrocyclization and reductive elimination to afford enol ether 133, which yields the cycloaddition product 134 via a subsequent hydrolysis (Scheme 28). This transformation also demonstrates that Fischer carbene complexes are highly selective in their reactivity toward alkynes in the presence of other multiple bonds (Table 6). 

The reaction of alkenylcarbene complexes and alkynes in the presence of Ni(0) leads to cycloheptatriene derivatives in a process which can be considered as a [3C+2S+2S] cycloaddition reaction [125]. As shown in Scheme 77, two molecules of the alkyne and one molecule of the carbene complex are involved in the formation of the cycloheptatriene. This reaction is supposed to proceed through the initial formation of a nickel alkenylcarbene complex. A subsequent double regioselective alkyne insertion produces a new nickel carbene complex, which evolves by an intramolecular cycloprop anation reaction to form a nor-caradiene intermediate. These species easily isomerise to the observed cycloheptatriene derivatives (Scheme 77). 

The subsequent insertion of the alkyne into the metal-carbene bond affords the (r]1 r]3)-vinylcarbene complex D, which may exist either as a (Z)- or an ( )-metallatriene. This intermediate maybe considered as a branching point in the benzannulation reaction as three diverging routes starting from this point have been explored. 

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