Cinchona-promoted asymmetric conjugate addition reactions

The asymmetric conjugate additions with thiol nucleophiles was further expanded to 2-mercaptobenzaldehydes [98]. Wang had previously developed a domino Michael-aldol reaction promoted by Cinchona alkaloids, and now illustrated the utihty of cyclohexane-diamine bifunctionalized catalysts for the domino... 

The asymmetric a-sulfenylation of ketones is a particularly challenging reaction, as demonstrated by the poor success reported in the stereoselective variants via classical enolate/azaenolate reaction with an electrophilic sulfur reagent [71]. An umpolung approach has been devised by Coltart and co-workers [72] to effect the first asymmetric a-sulfenylation of ketones with arene thiols. Nitroso alkene derivatives, in i/tM-generated under basic conditions from a-chloro oximes, reacted with arene thiols in the presence of cinchona thiourea 27, which promoted the conjugate addition of thiophenol (Scheme 14.25). The chiral nonracemic a-sulfenylated oximes were directly hydrolyzed by IBX to ketones in high yield and good enantioselectivity. 

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