Enamine intermediates aldehyde/enone addition

Enantioselective Michael additions of aldehydes to enones using imidazolidinones as organocatalysts show evidence of enamine intermediates.217 Several co-catalysts -mainly phenols - raise the yield and/or ee. 

An enantioselective intermolecular Michael addition of aldehydes (138) to enones (139), catalysed by imidazolidinones (140), has been reported. Chemoselectivity (Michael addition versus aldol) can be controlled through judicious choice of hydrogen bond-donating co-catalysts. The optimal imidazolidinone-hydrogen bond donor pair affords Michael addition products in <90% ee. Furthermore, the enamine intermediate was isolated and characterized and its efficacy as a nucleophile in the observed Michael addition reactions was demonstrated.172... 

Peelen TJ, Chi Y, Gellman SH (2005) Enantioselective organocatalytic Michael additions of aldehydes to enones with imidazolidinones cocatalyst effects and evidence for an enamine intermediate. J Am Chem Soc 127 11598— 11599... 

Peelen TJ, Chi YG, Gelhnan SH (2005) Enantioselective Organocatalytic Micltae/ Additions of Aldehydes to Enones with Imidazolidinones Cocatalyst Effects and Evidence for an Enamine Intermediate. J Am Chem Soc 127 11598... 

The synthesis is initiated by the organocatalyzed cascade that activates a,p-unsaturated aldehyde 8 with the formation of an iminium ion (Scheme 14.2). In this way, the imidazolidinone catalyst allows hydride transfer from the Hantzsch dihydropyridine 9 onto the highly activated conjugated alkene 11, which creates the nucleophilic enamine intermediate 12. Because of the chirality of the organocatalyst, stereoselective Michael addition (97% ee) to the adjacent enone occurs, with minor preference for the cis diastereomer (2 1 dr). Fortunately, this undesired diastereomer slowly epimerizes to the required trans isomer, which produces (-l-)-ricciocarpin A when treated with samarium triisopropoxide. Besides the Cannizzaro-like redox disproportionation, which allows the lactone producing Evans-Tihchenko reaction to occur, samarium(III) also enhances the epimerization to the trans isomer and therefore produces the desired isomer in high selectivity. 

Later, the same group expanded this chemistry further by developing a cascade Michael addition/cross-benzoin condensation sequence of enolizable aldehydes 43 and activated enones 44 [27]. The reaction proceeded by means of enamine activation of aliphatic aldehydes to induce an asymmetric Michael addition to activated enones followed by an intramolecular cross-benzoin condensation (Scheme 9.30). Compared with their previous work, complex cyclopentanones with complementary substitution patterns were observed. Screening of the reaction parameters revealed that the chiral triazolium catalyst was necessary to ensure a satisfactory stereochemical outcome. Further mechanistic insights indicated that the high diasteroselectivity observed attributed to the secondary amine-induced epimerizing of the a-position of intermediate aldehyde 89. 

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