Anhydrides alcohol synthesis, lithium aluminum hydride

On the basis of this mechanistic reasoning, it is apparent that acyl chlorides and anhydrides should also be reduced to primary alcohols by lithium aluminum hydride. Indeed, this is the case. However, because these compounds are less convenient to work with than esters and offer no advantages in synthesis, they are seldom used as substrates for such reductions. 

For the synthesis of 13-hydroxysparteine the starting material was a-picoline iV-oxide (CXVIII) which was nitrated and the nitro group then replaced by benzyloxy. The action of acetic anhydride induced the Boekelheide rearrangement to the acetoxymethyl derivative CXIX. The latter, via the alcohol, the chloride, the cyanide, and the ester, was condensed with ethyl hydroxymethylenepyridylacetate to the quinol-izone CXX, hydrogenation and reduction of which with lithium aluminum hydride gave a separable mixture of hydroxysparteines. The... 

Phthalyl alcohol, HOCH2CeH4CH20H-o. Mol. wt. 138.16, m.p. 64°. Prepared by reduction of phthalic anhydride with lithium aluminum hydride in ether (87% yield). In a novel and efficient synthesis of cyclopropanone hydrate, Grewe and Struve used the o-xylylene acetal protective group (1) and, after elimination of... 

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