Titanium complexes asymmetric epoxidation

The first practical method for asymmetric epoxidation of primary and secondary allylic alcohols was developed by K.B. Sharpless in 1980 (T. Katsuki, 1980 K.B. Sharpless, 1983 A, B, 1986 see also D. Hoppe, 1982). Tartaric esters, e.g., DET and DIPT" ( = diethyl and diisopropyl ( + )- or (— )-tartrates), are applied as chiral auxiliaries, titanium tetrakis(2-pro-panolate) as a catalyst and tert-butyl hydroperoxide (= TBHP, Bu OOH) as the oxidant. If the reaction mixture is kept absolutely dry, catalytic amounts of the dialkyl tartrate-titanium(IV) complex are suflicient, which largely facilitates work-up procedures (Y. Gao, 1987). Depending on the tartrate enantiomer used, either one of the 2,3-epoxy alcohols may be obtained with high enantioselectivity. The titanium probably binds to the diol grouping of one tartrate molecule and to the hydroxy groups of the bulky hydroperoxide and of the allylic alcohol... 

Transition metal-catalyzed epoxidations, by peracids or peroxides, are complex and diverse in their reaction mechanisms (Section 5.05.4.2.2) (77MI50300). However, most advantageous conversions are possible using metal complexes. The use of t-butyl hydroperoxide with titanium tetraisopropoxide in the presence of tartrates gave asymmetric epoxides of 90-95% optical purity (80JA5974). 

The emergence of the powerful Sharpless asymmetric epoxida-tion (SAE) reaction in the 1980s has stimulated major advances in both academic and industrial organic synthesis.14 Through the action of an enantiomerically pure titanium/tartrate complex, a myriad of achiral and chiral allylic alcohols can be epoxidized with exceptional stereoselectivities (see Chapter 19 for a more detailed discussion). Interest in the SAE as a tool for industrial organic synthesis grew substantially after Sharpless et al. discovered that the asymmetric epoxidation process can be conducted with catalytic amounts of the enantiomerically pure titanium/tartrate complex simply by adding molecular sieves to the epoxidation reaction mix-... 

Allylic alcohols can be converted to epoxy-alcohols with tert-butylhydroperoxide on molecular sieves, or with peroxy acids. Epoxidation of allylic alcohols can also be done with high enantioselectivity. In the Sharpless asymmetric epoxidation,allylic alcohols are converted to optically active epoxides in better than 90% ee, by treatment with r-BuOOH, titanium tetraisopropoxide and optically active diethyl tartrate. The Ti(OCHMe2)4 and diethyl tartrate can be present in catalytic amounts (15-lOmol %) if molecular sieves are present. Polymer-supported catalysts have also been reported. Since both (-t-) and ( —) diethyl tartrate are readily available, and the reaction is stereospecific, either enantiomer of the product can be prepared. The method has been successful for a wide range of primary allylic alcohols, where the double bond is mono-, di-, tri-, and tetrasubstituted. This procedure, in which an optically active catalyst is used to induce asymmetry, has proved to be one of the most important methods of asymmetric synthesis, and has been used to prepare a large number of optically active natural products and other compounds. The mechanism of the Sharpless epoxidation is believed to involve attack on the substrate by a compound formed from the titanium alkoxide and the diethyl tartrate to produce a complex that also contains the substrate and the r-BuOOH. ... 

Asymmetric epoxidation is another important area of activity, initially pioneered by Sharpless, using catalysts based on titanium tetraisoprop-oxide and either (+) or (—) dialkyl tartrate. The enantiomer formed depends on the tartrate used. Whilst this process has been widely used for the synthesis of complex carbohydrates it is limited to allylic alcohols, the hydroxyl group bonding the substrate to the catalyst. Jacobson catalysts (Formula 4.3) based on manganese complexes with chiral Shiff bases have been shown to be efficient in epoxidation of a wide range of alkenes. 

Following the success with the titanium-mediated asymmetric epoxidation reactions of allylic alcohols, work was intensified to seek a similar general method that does not rely on allylic alcohols for substrate recognition. A particularly interesting challenge was the development of catalysts for enantioselective oxidation of unfunctionalized olefins. These alkenes cannot form conformationally restricted chelate complexes, and consequently the differentiation of the enan-tiotropic sides of the substrate is considerably more difficult. 

Asymmetric epoxidation using a chiral titanium complex. 73... 

Nugent, W. A. (1998) Desymmetrization of meso-epoxides with halides A new catalytic reaction based on mechanistic insight, J. Am. Chem. Soc., 120 7139-7140. Bruns, S. Haufe, G. (1999) Catalytic asymmetric ring opening of epoxides to chlorohydrins with mild chloride donors and enantiopure titanium complexes.. 

In the context of asymmetric catalysis, titanium silsesquioxanes containing the chiral ligand (lR,2S,5R)-(-)-menthoxo ligand (MentO) (figure 14.3) have been synthesized from the monosilanol la (R = cyclopentyl) and Ti(OPr )4 [70]. The molecular complexes were tested as asymmetric homogeneous catalysts for the epoxidation of cinammic alcohol with tert-butyl hydroperoxide and compared... 

Zrrconium(IV) and hafnium(IV) complexes have also been employed as catalysts for the epoxidation of olefins. The general trend is that with TBHP as oxidant, lower yields of the epoxides are obtained compared to titanium(IV) catalyst and therefore these catalysts will not be discussed iu detail. For example, zirconium(IV) alkoxide catalyzes the epoxidation of cyclohexene with TBHP yielding less than 10% of cyclohexene oxide but 60% of (fert-butylperoxo)cyclohexene °. The zirconium and hafnium alkoxides iu combiuatiou with dicyclohexyltartramide and TBHP have been reported by Yamaguchi and coworkers to catalyze the asymmetric epoxidation of homoallylic alcohols . The most active one was the zirconium catalyst (equation 43), giving the corresponding epoxides in yields of 4-38% and enantiomeric excesses of <5-77%. This catalyst showed the same sense of asymmetric induction as titanium. Also, polymer-attached zirconocene and hafnocene chlorides (polymer-Cp2MCl2, polymer-CpMCls M = Zr, Hf) have been developed and investigated for their catalytic activity in the epoxidation of cyclohexene with TBHP as oxidant, which turned out to be lower than that of the immobilized titanocene chlorides . ... 

A.7. OTHER ASYMMETRIC EPOXIDATIONS AND OXIDATIONS CATALYZED BY TITANIUM COMPLEXES... 

The asymmetric oxidation of sulphides to chiral sulphoxides with t-butyl hydroperoxide is catalysed very effectively by a titanium complex, produced in situ from a titanium alkoxide and a chiral binaphthol, with enantioselectivities up to 96%342. The Sharpless oxidation of aryl cinnamyl selenides 217 gave a chiral 1-phenyl-2-propen-l-ol (218) via an asymmetric [2,3] sigmatropic shift (Scheme 4)343. For other titanium-catalysed epoxidations, see Section V.D.l on vanadium catalysis. 

The known allylic alcohol 9 derived from protected dimethyl tartrate is exposed to Sharpless asymmetric epoxidation conditions with (-)-diethyl D-tartrate. The reaction yields exclusively the anti epoxide 10 in 77 % yield. In contrast to the above mentioned epoxidation of the ribose derived allylic alcohol, in this case epoxidation of 9 with MCPBA at 0 °C resulted in a 65 35 mixture of syn/anti diastereomers. The Sharpless epoxidation of primary and secondary allylic alcohols discovered in 1980 is a powerful reagent-controlled reaction.12 The use of titanium(IV) tetraisopropoxide as catalyst, tert-butylhydro-peroxide as oxidant, and an enantiopure dialkyl tartrate as chiral auxiliary accomplishes the epoxidation of allylic alcohols with excellent stereoselectivity. If the reaction is kept absolutely dry, catalytic amounts of the dialkyl tartrate(titanium)(IV) complex are sufficient. 

Sharpless asymmetric epoxidation of allylic alcohols, asymmetric epoxidation of conjugated ketones, asymmetric sulfoxidations catalyzed, or mediated, by chiral titanium complexes, and allylic oxidations are the main classes of oxidation where asymmetric amplification effects have been discovered. The various references are listed in Table 4 with the maximum amplification index observed. 

In order to prevent competing homoallylic asymmetric epoxidation (AE, which, it will be recalled, preferentially delivers the opposite enantiomer to that of the allylic alcohol AE), the primary alcohol in 12 was selectively blocked as a thexyldimethylsilyl ether. Conventional Sharpless AE7 with the oxidant derived from (—)-diethyl tartrate, titanium tetraisopropoxide, and f-butyl hydroperoxide next furnished the anticipated a, [3-epoxy alcohol 13 with excellent stereocontrol (for a more detailed discussion of the Sharpless AE see section 8.4). Selective O-desilylation was then effected with HF-triethylamine complex. The resulting diol was protected as a base-stable O-isopropylidene acetal using 2-methoxypropene and a catalytic quantity of p-toluenesulfonic acid in dimethylformamide (DMF). Note how this blocking protocol was fully compatible with the acid-labile epoxide. 

Sharpless also found that this reaction works witlronly a catalytic amount of titanium-tartrate complex, because the reaction products can be displaced from the metal centre by more of the two reagents. The catalytic version of the asymmetric epoxidation is well suited to industrial exploitation, and the American Company J. T. Baker employs it to make synthetic disparlure, the pheromone of... 

The essence of titanium-catalyzed asymmetric epoxidation is illustrated in Figure 1. As shown there, the four essential components of the reaction are the allylic alcdiol substrate, a titanium(IV) alkoxide, a chiral tartrate ester and an aUcyl hydroperoxide. The asynunetric complex formed from these reagents de-... 

An important improvement in the asymmetric epoxidation process is the finding, reported in 1986, that by adding molecular sieves to the reaction medium virtually all reactions can be perfonned with a cata Ij c amount (S-10 mol%) of the titanium tartrate complex. Previously, only a few structural classes of idlylic alcdiols were efficiently epoxidized by less than stoichiometric amounts of the complex and most reactions were routinely perfonned with stoichiometric quantities of the reagent. The advantages of using a catalytic amount of complex include reagent economy, mildness of conditions, ease of isolation, increased yields and the potential for in situ derivatization of the product. However, there may be occa sions where the use of stoichiometric quantities of the catalytic complex is necessary. 

This section presents a summary of the currently preferred conditions fw perfrmning titanium-catalyzed asymmetric epoxidations and is derived primarily from the detailed account of Gao et al We wish to draw the reader s attention to several aspects of the terminology used here and throughout this chapter. The terms titanium tartrate complex and titanium tartrate catalyst are used interchangeably. The term stoichiometric reaction refers to the use of the titanium tartrate complex in a stoichiometric ratio (100 mol %) relative to the substrate (allylic alcohol). The term catalytic reaction (or quantity) refers to the use of the titanium tartrate complex in a catalytic ratio (usually S-10 mol %) relative to the substrate. 

Two aspects of stoichiometry are important in an asymmetric epoxidation one is the ratio of titanium to tartrate used for the catalyst and the other is the ratio of catalyst to substrate. With regard to the catalyst, it is crucial to obtaining the highest possible enantiomeric excess that at least a 10% excess of tartrate ester to titanium(IV) alkoxide be used in all asynunetric epoxidations. This is important when the reaction is being done with either a stoichiometric or a catalytic quantity of the complex. There appears to be no need to increase the excess of tartrate ester beyond 10-20% and, in fact, a larger excess has been shown to slow the epoxidation reaction unnecessarily. ... 

The concentration of substrate used in the asymmetric epoxidation must be given consideration because ccHnpeting side reactions may increase with increased reagent concentration. The use of catalytic quantities of the titanium tartrate complex has greatly reduced this problem. The epoxidation of most substrates under catalytic conditions may be perfoim at a substrate concentration up to 1 M. By contrast, epoxidations using stoichiometric amounts of complex are best run at substrate concentratitms [Pg.394]

Much of the experimental success of asymmetric epoxidation lies in exercising proper control of equation (5). Both Ti(OR)4 and [Ti(tartrate)(OR)2] are active epoxidation catalysts and since the former is achiral, any contribution by Aat species to the epoxidation will result in loss of enantioselectivity. The addition to the reaction of more than one equivalent of tartrate, relative to titanium, will have the effect of minimizing the leftward component of the equilibrium and will suppress the amount of Ti(OR)4 present in the reaction. The excess tartrate, however, forms Ti(taitrate)2 which has been shown to be a cataly-tically inactive species and which will cause a decrease in reaction rate that is proportional to the excess tartrate added. The need to minimize Ti(OR)4 concentration and, at the same time, to avoid a drastic reduction in rate of epoxidation is the basis for the recommendation of a 10-20 mol % excess of tartrate over titanium for formation of the catalytic complex. After the addition of hydroperoxide and allylic alcohol to the reaction, the concentration of ROH will increase accordingly and this will increase the leftward pressure on the equilibrium. Fortunately, in most situations this shift tq>paiently is extremely slight and is effectively suppressed by the use of excess tartrate. One situation in which a shift in the equilibrium does begin to occur is when the reaction is run in the catalytic mode and the amount of catalyst used is less than about 5 mol % relative to allylic alcohol substrate. Loss in enantioselectivity then may be observed. This factor is the basis of the recommendation for use of 5-10 mol % of titanium tartrate complex when using the catalytic version of asymmetric epoxidation. 

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