Cinchona alkaloid catalysts nucleophilic substitution

The first organocatalyzed conjugate addition of a-substituted p-ketoester to a,P-unsaturated ketones was presented by Deng et al. [42] (Scheme 3). Although traditional Cinchona alkaloids were efficient catalysts for conjugate addition of carbon nucleophiles to nitroalkenes and sulfones, replacement of the C(9)-OH with an ester group (Q-7b) showed great improvement in stereoselectivity. The reaction is applicable to a variety of cyclic and acyclic enones (16,18). 

Aldol reactions using a quaternary chinchona alkaloid-based ammonium salt as orga-nocatalyst Several quaternary ammonium salts derived from cinchona alkaloids have proven to be excellent organocatalysts for asymmetric nucleophilic substitutions, Michael reactions and other syntheses. As described in more detail in, e.g., Chapters 3 and 4, those salts act as chiral phase-transfer catalysts. It is, therefore, not surprising that catalysts of type 31 have been also applied in the asymmetric aldol reaction [65, 66], The aldol reactions were performed with the aromatic enolate 30a and benzaldehyde in the presence of ammonium fluoride salts derived from cinchonidine and cinchonine, respectively, as a phase-transfer catalyst (10 mol%). For example, in the presence of the cinchonine-derived catalyst 31 the desired product (S)-32a was formed in 65% yield (Scheme 6.16). The enantioselectivity, however, was low (39% ee) [65],... 

In 2005, Schaus and coworkers found that the natural cinchona alkaloids such as cinchonine (CN) or cinchonidine (CD) themselves can serve as highly enantioselective catalysts (10mol%) for the Mannich reaction of P-keto esters 57 with the various carbamate-protected aryl imines 58 [25]. Using either CN or CD, both enantiomers of the resulting secondary amine products 59 were obtained in excellent yields (up to 99%) and ee values (up to 96% ee) (Scheme 8.19). The extension of this protocol to encompass the use of the 2-substituted-l,3-dicarbonyl nucleophiles 60... 

Jorgensen developed a catalytic regioselective and enantioselective nucleophilic aromatic substitution reaction of activated aromatic compounds with 1,3-dicarbonyl compounds under phase-transfer conditions. This was crucial for obtaining the C-arylated product 61 predominantly with high enantioselectivity by replacing a benzyl with a benzoate group in the cinchona alkaloids-derived phase-transfer catalyst (Scheme 11.13) [49]. 

Addition of CH2(CN)2 to -substituted 2-enoylpyridines RCH=CHCO(2-Py), catalysed by the cinchona alkaloid-based bifunctional ureas, such as (345) (10mol%), has been reported to proceed with <97% ee in m-xylene at room temperature. Squaramide (346) proved to be even more efficient for the addition of the same nucleophile to enones R CH=CHCOR, which required only 0.5 mol% catalyst loading to attain <96% ee (in CHCI3 at room temperature), ... 

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