Dienes reactions with hydrogen sulfide

By far most of the reports on addition reactions of hetero-nucleophiles to activated dienes deal with sulfur-nucleophiles17,48,80,120-137, in particular in the synthesis of 7/3-sulfur-substituted steroids which, like their carbon-substituted counterparts (Section n.A), are of interest because of their ability to inhibit the biosynthesis of estrogens80,129-137. Early investigations17,120-122 concentrated on simple acyclic Michael acceptors like methyl sorbate and 2,4-pentadienenitrile. Bravo and coworkers120 observed the formation of a 3 1 mixture of the 1,6- and 1,4-adduct in the reaction of methyl sorbate with methanethiol in basic medium (equation 39). In contrast to this, 2,4-pentadienenitrile adds various thiols regioselectively at C-5, i.e. in a 1,6-fashion (equation 40)17,121,122, and the same is true for reactions of this substrate with hydrogen sulfide (equation 41), sodium bisulfite and ethyl thioglycolate17. 

The intramolecular addition of thiols to alkenes provides a novel entry into heterocycles. One example of this is the reaction of hydrogen sulfide with various nonconjugated dienes to form six-membered rings (equation 302).549 550... 

Sodium Salt (54)3717a,20 20,21-Bismethylenedioxy-1, 2 -dihydroxypregn-4-ene-3, l-dione (53).37 A solution of 100 g of 17a,20 20,21-bismethylene-dioxypregna-l,4-diene-3,ll-dione (prednisone BMD) (52) in 720 ml of pyridine is cooled to 5° and treated with a solution of 69.9 g of osmium tetroxide in 408 ml of pyridine. The mixture, which turns black within 5 min is allowed to stand at room temperature for five days and then is added with stirring to 13.4 liters of petroleum ether. The crude osmate ester is isolated by filtration and washed with petroleum ether to remove most of the residual pyridine. The crude product is dissolved in 8 liters of dioxane and kept in an ice bath while a slow stream of hydrogen sulfide is bubbled through the reaction mixture. The precipitated osmium sulfide is removed by filtration, and the filtrate is concentrated to dryness in vacuo. The residual foam is dissolved in 2 liters of acetone, decolorized with activated carbon, filtered and concentrated to a volume of 1 liter. Addition of 1 liter of Skellysolve B affords 38 g of diol (53) A OH 236 mfi (e 14,100). 

Reaction of a four-carbon unit with sulfur sources such as hydrogen sulfide, carbon disulfide, and elemental sulfur is one of the traditional thiophene syntheses that belong to this category (Equation 18). A wide variety of hydrocarbons, for example, alkanes, alkenes, dienes, alkynes, and diynes, serve as four-carbon units. Another practical method is the sulfuration of 1,4-dicarbonyl compounds (Paal synthesis). The method has become very popular with development of sulfuration reagents such as Lawesson s reagent. The reaction of a,/3-unsaturated nitriles with elemental sulfur in basic media, Gewald synthesis, is also useful for the preparation of 2-aminothiophenes which are important compounds in dyestuff and pharmaceutical industries. 

Apparently the alkoxy radical, R O , abstracts a hydrogen from the substrate, H, and the resulting radical, R" , is oxidized by Cu " (one-electron transfer) to form a carbonium ion that reacts with the carboxylate ion, RCO - The overall process is a chain reaction in which copper ion cycles between + 1 and +2 oxidation states. Suitable substrates include olefins, alcohols, mercaptans, ethers, dienes, sulfides, amines, amides, and various active methylene compounds (44). This reaction can also be used with tert-huty peroxycarbamates to introduce carbamoyloxy groups to these substrates (243). 

A primary alcohol and amines can be used as an aldehyde precursor, because it can be oxidized by transfer hydrogenation. For example, the reaction of benzyl alcohol with excess olefin afforded the corresponding ketone in good yield in the presence of Rh complex and 2-amino-4-picoline [18]. Similarly, primary amines, which were transformed into imines by dehydrogenation, were also employed as a substrate instead of aldehydes [19]. Although various terminal olefins, alkynes [20], and even dienes [21] have been commonly used as a reaction partner in hydroiminoacylation reactions, internal olefins were ineffective. Recently, methyl sulfide-substituted aldehydes were successfully applied to the intermolecu-lar hydroacylation reaction [22], Also in the intramolecular hydroacylation, extension of substrates such as cyclopropane-substituted 4-enal [23], 4-alkynal [24], and 4,6-dienal [25] has been developed (Table 1). 

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