Carbanions conjugate addition reactions

Rifamycin S also undergoes conjugate addition reactions to the quinone ring by a variety of nucleophiles including ammonia, primary and secondary amines, mercaptans, carbanions, and enamines giving the C-3 substituted derivatives (38) of rifamycin SV (117,120,121). Many of the derivatives show excellent antibacterial properties (109,118,122,123). The 3-cycHc amino derivatives of rifamycin SV also inhibit the polymerase of RNA tumor vimses (123,124). 

The mechanism of the cyanide- and thioazolium ion-catalyzed conjugate addition reactions is considered to be analogous to the Lapworth mechanism for the cyanide-catalyzed benzoin condensation. Thus the cyano-stabilized carbanion resulting from deprotonation of the cyanohydrin of the aldehyde is presumed to be the actual Michael donor. After conjugate addition to the activated olefin, cyanide is eliminated to form the product and regenerate the catalyst. 

Many carbanionic nucleophiles that would be considered too hard to react as Michael donors can be made into effective reagents for conjugate addition reactions by appending resonance or inductively stabilizing groups to soften their intrinsic Lewis basicity. Such stabilized anionic Michael donors include enolates, alkylthio-substituted carbanions, ylides and nitro-substituted carbanions. 

Conjugate addition reactions are some of the most fundamental C-C bondforming reactions in organic synthesis, and their asymmetric versions have been studied extensively [ 1 ]. Treated in this chapter is the catalytic conjugate addition of stabihzed carbanions, especially enolate derivatives, for which the term Michael addition and/or reaction is used. The asymmetric Michael reactions can be categorized into two groups (Fig. 1) ... 

A conjugate addition reaction does not occur unless there is a group attached to the double bond that can help stabilize the carbanion intermediate by resonance. The first reaction does not occur because the methyl group will not stabilize the carbanion intermediate. The second reaction occurs because the nitro group can help stabilize the carbanion intermediate by resonance. 

A powerful application of such chiral oxazolines is found in addition reactions to substituted naphthalenes (Scheme 3.14) [71-73]. Chiral oxazoline 82 undergoes conjugate addition reactions with carbanions and other nucleophiles to furnish a stabilized carbanion intermediate 83 [71]. This could be trapped with a variety of electrophiles to provide products such as 84 with 98 2 diastereoselectivity. Following auxiliary removal, the sequence provides... 

A synthetically useful reaction known as the Michael reaction, or Michael addition, involves nucleophilic addition of carbanions to a p unsaturated ketones The most common types of carbanions used are enolate 10ns derived from p diketones These enolates are weak bases (Section 18 6) and react with a p unsaturated ketones by conjugate addition... 

Potassium or lithium derivatives of ethyl acetate, dimethyl acetamide, acetonitrile, acetophenone, pinacolone and (trimethylsilyl)acetylene are known to undergo conjugate addition to 3-(t-butyldimethylsiloxy)-1 -cyclohexenyl t-butyl sulfone 328. The resulting a-sulfonyl carbanions 329 can be trapped stereospecifically by electrophiles such as water and methyl iodide417. When the nucleophile was an sp3-hybridized primary anion (Nu = CH2Y), the resulting product was mainly 330, while in the reaction with (trimethylsilyl)acetylide anion the main product was 331. 

Protonation of the enolate ion is chiefly at the oxygen, which is more negative than the carbon, but this produces the enol, which tautomerizes. So, although the net result of the reaction is addition to a carbon-carbon double bond, the mechanism is 1,4 nucleophilic addition to the C=C—C=0 (or similar) system and is thus very similar to the mechanism of addition to carbon-oxygen double and similar bonds (see Chapter 16). When Z is CN or a C=0 group, it is also possible for Y to attack at this carbon, and this reaction sometimes competes. When it happens, it is called 1,2 addition. 1,4 Addition to these substrates is also known as conjugate addition. The Y ion almost never attacks at the 3 position, since the resulting carbanion would have no resonance stabilization " ... 

Several examples of conjugate addition of carbanions carried out under aprotic conditions are given in Scheme 2.24. The reactions are typically quenched by addition of a proton source to neutralize the enolate. It is also possible to trap the adduct by silylation or, as we will see in Section 2.6.2, to carry out a tandem alkylation. Lithium enolates preformed by reaction with LDA in THF react with enones to give 1,4-diketones (Entries 1 and 2). Entries 3 and 4 involve addition of ester enolates to enones. The reaction in Entry 3 gives the 1,2-addition product at —78°C but isomerizes to the 1,4-product at 25° C. Esters of 1,5-dicarboxylic acids are obtained by addition of ester enolates to a,(3-unsaturated esters (Entry 5). Entries 6 to 8 show cases of... 

The intermediate product 162, formed from the nudeophilic addition of 1,2-alle-nic phosphonate or 1,2-allenic phosphine oxide with allylic alcohol, would also undergo a Claisen rearrangement to form 2-oxo-5-alkenyl phosphonate or phosphine oxide 163 [85], The rearrangement is accelerated by the carbanionic nature of the intermediate 162. For the conjugate addition step, the reaction temperature is crucial since the reaction at 0 °C afforded mainly /i,y-unsaturated product whereas a,/8-unsaturated products were formed at 20 °C. 

The previous sections have dealt primarily with reactions in which the new carbon-carbon bond is formed by an SN2 reaction between the nucleophilic carbanions and the alkylating reagent. Another important method for alkylation of carbon involves the addition of a nucleophilic carbon species to an electrophilic multiple bond. The electrophilic reaction partner is typically an a,/i-unsaturated ketone, aldehyde, or ester, but other electron-withdrawing substituents such as nitro, cyano, or sulfonyl also activate carbon-carbon double and triple bonds to nucleophilic attack. The reaction is called conjugate addition or the Michael reaction. Other kinds of nucleophiles such as amines, alkoxides, and sulfide anions also react similarly, but we will focus on the carbon-carbon bondforming reactions. 

Reactions of this type are referred to in a variety of terms, many of which are rather confusing and nondescriptive. They sometimes are classified as 1,4-additions, implying that addition occurs across the terminal positions of the conjugated system. A synonymous term is conjugate addition. When the nucleophile is a carbanion, the reaction is called a Michael addition. Thus, by this definition, Equation 17-7 represents a Michael addition. Another, perhaps more typical, example is the addition of an enolate to a conjugated ketone ... 

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