2,3-aziridino alcohols

The radical-induced cleavage of a,/ -aziridino alcohols proceeds in analogy to that of a,/ -epoxyalcohols, leading regiospecifically to allyl amines (a). By successive reactions with double bond systems, pyrrolidines are formed (b) [68]... 

Enantioselective addition of diethylzinc to benzaldehyde has been promoted by indole-containing chiral oxazolidines (which are able to use both O and N atoms to effect metal coordination in the transition state), and by chiral o-hydroxyphenyl diaza-phospholidine oxide,and by chiral aziridino alcohols.Enantioselective addition of dialkylzinc to prostereogenic ketones has been promoted using chiral camphorsul-fonamide derivatives. 

High enantioselectivity has been achieved on addition of diethylzinc to benzaldehyde catalysed by a chiral diamine, (,S )-2-(A,A -disubstitutcd aminomethyl)pyrrolidine,116 and by chiral helical titanate complexes of tetradentate ligands.117 Enantioselective additions of dialkylzinc reagents to A,-(diphcnylphosphiiioyl)imines, promoted by aziridino alcohols,118 and to the carbon-nitrogen double bond of the nitrone 3,4-dihydroisoquinoline A-oxide, promoted by dicyclopentyl(R,R)-tartrate,119 have also been reported. 

The direct strong steric interaction between substrate substituents and ligand substituents has been demonstrated in asymmetric addition of diethylzinc to aldehydes catalysed by sterically congested ferrocenyl aziridino alcohol derivatives.114 In addi- tion, this non-bonded steric repulsion influenced enantioselectivities significantly, and even led to inversion of the absolute configuration. This fact was further confirmed by theoretical calculations and the design of a new chiral ferrocenyl aziridino alcohol ligand. 

The AA of cinnamate substrates also provided access to the hydroxyaspargine 40, a key subunit of ramoplanin A2 [68], and has been used in the synthesis of aziridino alcohol 41 for use as a chiral ligand [69] (Scheme 6). 

Reaction of aziridino alcohols with Lewis acids provides /3-amino carbonyl compounds in excellent yields <20020L363, 20030L2319>. Treatment of aziridine 181 with ZnBt2 at room temperature initiates a migration of the aromatic ring to provide aldehyde 182 as a single diastereomer in 96% yield (Equation 51). 

The Lewis acid-catalyzed aza-Payne rearrangement was utilized in the total synthesis of ep/-7-deoxypancratistatin by T. Hudlicky and co-workers. The 2,3-aziridino alcohol was treated with f-BuLi, to generate the epoxy amide that was trapped with piperonyl bromide. 

As part of an ongoing research program directed toward the use of chiral aziridines in asymmetric synthesis [36], Andersson, Tanner and co-workers have recently reported the detailed results of their own findings in the field of catalytic asymmetric dialkylzinc alkylation of imines [37dj. Tanner et al. had previously communicated their success in the catalytic asymmetric addition of organolith-ium reagents to imines with C2-symmetric bis(aziridines) [37a, 37b]. This was followed by a preliminary report on the use of aziridino alcohols as well as simple aziridines for the addition of diethylzinc to M-diphenylphosphinoylimines [37c]. The most recent report is an extension of this study, and includes the detailed preparation of the ligands [37d]. 

The aziridino alcohols that have been prepared and tested as chiral promoters for the catalytic asymmetric dialkylzinc alkylation of imines are shown in Fig. 4. The authors have investigated three different approaches to obtain the ligands in enantiomerically pure form (1) the use of the chiral pool, (2) the Sharpless asymmetric aminohydroxylation, and (3) the Sharpless asymmetric dihydroxylation. The starting materials for the preparation of the aziridino alcohols 30, 31a-h, 32a,b, and 33 were the readily available amino acids L-serine, L-threonine, and aZZo-L-threonine. 

Tu et al. reported the stereoselective rearrangement of 2,3-aziridino alcohols, which... 

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