Bonding carbonyl ylide structures

Tetracyano ethylene oxide, however, which represents a potential 1,3-dipole of the carbonyl ylide type, reacts with diphenyl cyclopropenone to give a cycloadduct of probable structure 415/417263, which may arise from insertion into the cyclopropenone C1(2)/C3 bond. 

The structure of the carbonyl ylide reveals that it is a 1,3-dipolar species and is poised to undergo a variety of different reactions. The ability of carbonyl ylides to engage in bond-forming processes has promoted their use in organic synthesis. Although there are several pathways open to these zwitterionic intermediates, there are a few that have been the focus of detailed mechanistic and synthetic investigations (Fig. 4.2). 

Thus far, in the alkaloid series discussed, the nitrogen atom has always been part of the core of the alkaloid structure, rather than acting in a dipolarophilic manner in the cycloaddition of the carbonyl ylide. Recently, Padwa et al. (117) addressed this deficiency by conducting model studies to synthesize the core of ribasine, an alkaloid containing the indanobenzazepine skeleton with a bridging ether moiety (Scheme 4.57). Padwa found that indeed it was possible to use a C = N it-bond as the dipolarophile. In the first generation, a substituted benzylidene imine (219) was added after formation of the putative carbonyl ylide from diazoketone 218. The result was formation of both the endo and exo adduct with the endo adduct favored in an 8 1 ratio. This indicates that the endo transition state was slightly favored as dictated by symmetry controlled HOMO—LUMO interactions. 

In recent years there has been a growing interest in the use of carbonyl ylides as 1,3-dipoles for total synthesis.127-130 Their dipolar cycloaddition to alkenic, alkynic and hetero multiple bonded dipolaro-philes has been well documented.6 Methods for the generation of carbonyl ylides include the thermal and photochemical opening of oxiranes,131 the thermal fragmentation of certain heterocyclic structures such as A3-l,3,4-oxadiazolines (141) or l,3-dioxolan-4-ones132-134 (142) and the reaction of carbenes or car-benoids with carbonyl derivatives.133-138 Formation of a carbonyl ylide by attack of a rhodium carbenoid... 

Examples of 1,3-dipoles include diazoalkanes, nitrones, carbonyl ylides and fulminic acid. Organic chemists typically describe 1,3-dipolar cycloaddition reactions [15] in terms of four out-of-plane 71 electrons from the dipole and two from the dipolarophile. Consequently, most of the interest in the electronic structure of 1,3-dipoles has been concentrated on the distribution of the four Jt electrons over the three heavy atom centres. Of course, a characteristic feature of this class of molecules is that it presents awkward problems for classical valence theories a conventional fashion of representing such systems invokes resonance between a number of zwitterionic and diradical structures [16-19]. Much has been written on the amount of diradical character, with widely differing estimates of the relative weights of the different bonding schemes. 

In our opinion, heterofullerenes with divalent heteroatoms, like O and S, are potentially interesting compounds because they could possibly exist as neutral ylide structures with > C-0+< and > C-S+< bonds, respectively. Alternative structures for C59O and C59S are less ionic truncated quasi-fullerene structures bearing a carbonyl or thiocarbonyl moiety, as shown in Fig. 35. 

S.2.2.6. Tetrahydrofurans from Carbonyl Ylides. Carbonyl ylides are unusual species that must be generated as needed. One method is to break the C-C bond of certain epoxides thermally or photochemically, which yields an open chain. Thereby one carbon is positively charged and the other is negatively charged, which is the structural feature of carbonyl ylides. This is shown in Scheme 5.33 A. Cycloaddition with an alkene follows immediately to give tetrahydrofuran derivatives (Scheme 5.33). 

The initial step of olefin formation is a nucleophilic addition of the negatively polarized ylide carbon center (see the resonance structure 1 above) to the carbonyl carbon center of an aldehyde or ketone. A betain 8 is thus formed, which can cyclize to give the oxaphosphetane 9 as an intermediate. The latter decomposes to yield a trisubstituted phosphine oxide 4—e.g. triphenylphosphine oxide (with R = Ph) and an alkene 3. The driving force for that reaction is the formation of the strong double bond between phosphorus and oxygen ... 

Olefination Reactions Involving Phosphonium Ylides. The synthetic potential of phosphonium ylides was developed initially by G. Wittig and his associates at the University of Heidelberg. The reaction of a phosphonium ylide with an aldehyde or ketone introduces a carbon-carbon double bond in place of the carbonyl bond. The mechanism originally proposed involves an addition of the nucleophilic ylide carbon to the carbonyl group to form a dipolar intermediate (a betaine), followed by elimination of a phosphine oxide. The elimination is presumed to occur after formation of a four-membered oxaphosphetane intermediate. An alternative mechanism proposes direct formation of the oxaphosphetane by a cycloaddition reaction.236 There have been several computational studies that find the oxaphosphetane structure to be an intermediate.237 Oxaphosphetane intermediates have been observed by NMR studies at low temperature.238 Betaine intermediates have been observed only under special conditions that retard the cyclization and elimination steps.239... 

A structurally unusual 3-blocker that uses a second molecule of itself as the substituent on nitrogen is included here in spite of the ubiquity of this class of compounds. Exhaustive hydrogenation of the chromone (13-1) leads to a reduction of both the double bond and the carbonyl group, as in the case of (11-2). The car-boxyhc acid is then reduced to an aldehyde (13-2) by means of diisobutylaluminum hydride. Reaction of that intermediate with the ylide from trimethylsulfonium iodide gives the oxirane (13-3) via the addition-displacement process discussed earlier (see Chapters 3 and 8). Treatment of an excess of that epoxide with benzylamine leads to the addition of two equivalents of that compound with each basic nitrogen (13-4). The product is then debenzylated by catalytic reduction over palladium to afford nebivolol (13-5) [16]. The presence of four chiral centers in the product predicts the existence of 16 chiral pairs. 

As we might expect from the dipolar structure, ylides can behave as carbon nucleophiles to form carbon-carbon bonds by addition to the carbonyl groups of aldehydes and ketones ... 

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