Acrylates, asymmetric aziridination

The asymmetric aziridination of a, P-unsaturated carboxylic acid derivatives is a direct route to optically active aza-cyclic a-amino acids, and this class of chiral aziridines can also be used as chiral building blocks for the preparation of other amino acids, P-lactams, and alkaloids. Prabhakar and coworkers carried out an asymmetric aziridination reaction of tert-butyl acrylate with O-pivaloyl-N-arylhydroxylamine 25 in the presence of cinchonine-derived chiral ammonium salt 2e under phase-transfer conditions, which furnished the corresponding chiral N-arylaziridine 26 with moderate enantioselectivity (Scheme 2.24) [46],... 

Significant recent interest in the transition metal catalyzed reactions of imidoiodanes was initiated in the 1990s by the pioneering works of Evans [586, 763, 764] and Jacobsen [765,766] on the asymmetric aziridination of olefins using copper catalysts (2-10 mol%) with chiral dinitrogen ligands and PhD JTs as the nitrene precursor. Since these initial publications, research activity in this area has surged and the copper-catalyzed aziridination of alkenes has been utilized in numerous syntheses. For example, Dodd and coworkers applied the Evans aziridination procedure to 2-substituted acrylates and cinnamates 649 [767] and to steroids 650 (Scheme 3.257) [768]. 

Asymmetric Aziridination of Alkenes. The copper-catalyzed aziridination reaction can be rendered enantioselective by the addition of chiral ligands. The first example of an enantioselective aziridination of an alkene employed the bis(oxazoline) ligand (4) (R = f-Bu) and copper(I) trifluoromethanesulfonate as the metal catalyst (eq 14). This catalyst system affords the aziridine in 97% yield and 61% ee. Other reports have appeared subsequently regarding the extended scope of this reaction. " Important contributions to this area include the copper/bis-(oxazoline)-catalyzed aziridination of aryl acrylate esters (eq 15) and the copper/bis(imine)-catalyzed aziridination of cyclic cis-alkenes with the bis(imine) ligand (5) (eqs 16 and 17). ... 

Very recently, an asymmetric synthesis of enantiomerically pure aziridine carboxylic acid derivatives has been published based on a similar reaction type starting from the corresponding a-bromo acrylic acid derivatives135. 

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