Cinchona Alkaloids in Phase-Transfer Catalysis

Phase-transfer catalysis is a widely appUed method for all kinds of chemical reactions under mild conditions involving ionic intermediates. It is also a recognized strategy for asymmetric transformations even though the relationship between 

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The first organocatalytic asymmetric aziridination reactions of electron-deficient olefins made use of either (i) a chiral tertiary amine combined with a 0-phosphinyl or sulfonyl hydroxylamine for the in situ generation of aminimides as aziridination reagents [133, 134], or (ii) a quaternary salt of cinchona alkaloids in phase-transfer catalysis in combination with ethyl nosyloxycarbamate [135], A-acyl A-aryl... 

Alkylation of Schiff bases, derived from amino acid and non-optically active aromatic aldehydes by phase-transfer catalysis in the presence of cinchona alkaloid derived quaternary ammonium salts, gave ce values of up to 50% l42. 

As reviewed in this chapter, cinchona alkaloids have played a crucial role in the development of asymmetric phase-transfer catalysis since its advent, and today constitute a privileged structural motif that may be widely utilized for the design of new chiral quaternary ammonium salts. These benefits are due not only to the... 

In particular, it is not only the cinchona alkaloids that are suitable chiral sources for asymmetric organocatalysis [6], but also the corresponding ammonium salts. Indeed, the latter are particularly useful for chiral PTCs because (1) both pseudo enantiomers of the starting amines are inexpensive and available commercially (2) various quaternary ammonium salts can be easily prepared by the use of alkyl halides in a single step and (3) the olefin and hydroxyl functions are beneficial for further modification of the catalyst. In this chapter, the details of recent progress on asymmetric phase-transfer catalysis are described, with special focus on cinchona-derived ammonium salts, except for asymmetric alkylation in a-amino acid synthesis. 

Cinchona Alkaloids in Asymmetric Phase-Transfer Catalysis... 

Another important asymmetric epoxidation of a conjugated systems is the reaction of alkenes with polyleucine, DBU and urea H2O2, giving an epoxy-carbonyl compound with good enantioselectivity. The hydroperoxide anion epoxidation of conjugated carbonyl compounds with a polyamino acid, such as poly-L-alanine or poly-L-leucine is known as the Julia—Colonna epoxidation Epoxidation of conjugated ketones to give nonracemic epoxy-ketones was done with aq. NaOCl and a Cinchona alkaloid derivative as catalyst. A triphasic phase-transfer catalysis protocol has also been developed. p-Peptides have been used as catalysts in this reaction. ... 

Enantioselective introduction of a side chain to glycine involves alkylation of 14, of 15, and a bomanesultam derivative under solid-liquid phase transfer catalysis conditions. Chiral catalysts serving in the alkylation of iV-protected glycine esters include the quatemized cinchona alkaloid 16. Another method involves alkylation of 17 (both enantiomers are available). 

The asymmetric alkylation of glycine derivatives is one of the most simple methods by which to obtain optically active a-amino acids [31]. The enantioselective alkylation of glycine Schiff base 52 under phase-transfer catalysis (PTC) conditions and catalyzed by a quaternary cinchona alkaloid, as pioneered by O Donnell [32], allowed impressive degrees of enantioselection to be achieved using only a very simple procedure. Some examples of polymer-supported cinchona alkaloids are shown in Scheme 3.14. Polymer-supported chiral quaternary ammonium salts 48 have been easily prepared from crosslinked chloromethylated polystyrene (Merrifield resin) with an excess of cinchona alkaloid in refluxing toluene [33]. The use of these polymer-supported quaternary ammonium salts allowed high enantioselectivities (up to 90% ee) to be obtained. 

Some other very important events in the historic development of asymmetric organocatalysis appeared between 1980 and the late 1990s, such as the development of the enantioselective alkylation of enolates using cinchona-alkaloid-based quaternary ammonium salts under phase-transfer conditions or the use of chiral Bronsted acids by Inoue or Jacobsen for the asymmetric hydro-cyanation of aldehydes and imines respectively. These initial reports acted as the launching point for a very rich chemistry that was extensively developed in the following years, such as the enantioselective catalysis by H-bonding activation or the asymmetric phase-transfer catalysis. The same would apply to the development of enantioselective versions of the Morita-Baylis-Hillman reaction,to the use of polyamino acids for the epoxidation of enones, also known as the Julia epoxidation or to the chemistry by Denmark in the phosphor-amide-catalyzed aldol reaction. ... 

Asymmetric phase-transfer catalysis usually stands somewhat separate from the rest of asymmetric organocatalysis and has always been dominated by metal-free catalysts. The earliest report in asymmetric phase-transfer catalysis dates back 30 years to 1984 when Dolling and coworkers first reported the use of a quaternised Cinchona alkaloid (6) as a phase-transfer catalyst for the asymmetric alleviation of ketone 7 during an asymmetric synthesis of (- -)-Indacrinone (Scheme 1.5). Quaternised Cinchona alkaloids dominated the area of asymmetric phase-transfer catalysis for the rest of the 20th century, and were especially used as catalysts for asymmetric amino... 

Phase-transfer catalysis is one of the most practical synthetic methodologies because of its operational simplicity and mild reaction conditions, which enable applications in industrial syntheses as a sustainable green chemical process. As reviewed in this chapter, diverse Cinchona alkaloid-derived quaternaiy ammonium salts have been developed via the modification of Cinchona alkaloids based on steric or electronic factors as highly efficient chiral PTC catalysts and successfully applied in various asymmetric organic reactions. Despite the successful development and application of these catalysts, some problems remain to be addressed. Although Cinchona alkaloids have unique structural features, resulting in the availability of four... 

Asymmetric phase-transfer catalysis is a method that has for almost three decades proven its high utility. Although its typical application is for (non-natural) amino acid synthesis, over the years other types of applications have been reported. The unique capability of quaternary ammonium salts to form chiral ion pairs with anionic intermediates gives access to stereoselective transformations that are otherwise very difficult to conduct using metal catalysts or other organocatalysts. Thus, this catalytic principle has created its own very powerful niche within the field of asymmetric catalysis. As can be seen in Table 5 below, the privileged catalyst structures are mostly Cinchona alkaloid-based, whereas the highly potent Maruoka-type catalysts have so far not been applied routinely to complex natural product total synthesis. 

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