Dienophiles, alkynes allenes

Dienophiles substituted with appropriate heteroatoms may offer a number of advantages such as (1) provide dienophilic equivalents of C-—C and moieties which do not undergo [4 + 2] cycloadditions to 1,3-dienes because of low (e.g. isolated alkenes, alkynes, allenes) or different reactivities (e.g. ketenes) (2) enhance or invert the regiochemistry of the Diels-Alder process (3) permit facile removal of the activating and/or regiocontrolling group after cycloaddition with or without introduction of further functionalities. The use of nitroalkenes as dienophiles demonstrates these issues most strikingly. 

The dienophiles for reaction with butadiene can be alkenes, allenes, and alkynes. Simple alkenes like ethylene are poor dienophiles resulting in sluggish reactions. Substituted olefins, X—C=C—X, are more reactive when X and/or X are C=C, Ar, COOR, COOH, COH, COR, COC1, CN,... 

Although obtained only in low yields upon troublesome chromatography of product mixtures that contained much polymeric material, the tricyclic benzofuran and benzothiophene lactones (61) were shown to be isolable products from attempted Diels-Alder reactions on the allene ester precursors shown in Equation (32) <85JCS(Pl)747>. Although it was noted in the case of the two thiophenes that the tricyclics appeared to be forming from a precursor (presumably a dihydro form) on the chromatographic column, it was not possible to convert the crude suspected cycloaddition adducts directly into the aromatics by dehydrogenation with DDQ. Complex mixtures were obtained instead. It is possible that the actual dienophiles in these Diels-Alder reactions are alkynes. In a related study, the bis-lactone (62) was also obtained (Equation (33)) <86H(24)88l>. 

Furan also undergoes cycloadditions with allenes," " with benzyne" and with simpler dienophiles, like acrylonitrile and acrylate various Lewis acidic catalysts can assist" in some cases, zinc iodide is one such, hafnium tetrachloride another, and improved endo exo ratios are obtained in an ionic liquid as reaction solvent. Maleate and fumarate esters react if the addition is conducted under high pressure. This device can also be used to increase markedly the reactivity of 2-methoxyfuran and 2-acetoxyfuran towards dienophiles. At higher reaction temperatures alkynes and even electron-rich alkenes will add to furan. 3- or 5-Halo-furans react faster in these cycloadditions. ... 

Reactions with conjugated enynes as dienes in Diels-Alder reactions yield cyclohexadiene or benzene products on reaction with alkene or alkyne dienophiles, respectively. These reactions proceed via a stepwise mechanism to avoid formation of a cyclic allene and are referred to as dehydro-Diels-Alder reactions. In 2008, Barluenga and Aguilar demonstrated that gold catalysts promote intermolecular hetero-dehydro-Diels-Alder reactions between dienynes and nitriles. Dienyne 99 combines with phenyinitrile (100) to afford substituted pyridine 101. ... 

Alkynic dienophiles also work well, e.g. ethyl propiolate and (1) produce the expected cyclohexadiene ester in 77% yield. In addition to simple dienophiles, a number of allenic dienophiles have also been utilized, as shown in Table 2. Cyclic dienophiles, enones, lactams, etc., are often reacted with (1) to give fused bicyclic systems, but generally the yields are only in the 25-45% range, e.g. reaction of (1) with (13) gives (14) in 27% 3field (eq 2). ... 

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