Enantioselective oxygen transfer

E. J. Corey, Y. Bo, J. Busch-Peterson, Highly Enantioselective Phase Transfer Catalyzed Alkylation of a 3-Oxygenated Propionic Ester Equivalent Application and Mechanism , J. Am Chem Soc 1998, 120, 13000-13001. 

Table 17) with two substituents in position C3 the oxygen transfer by the chiral hydroperoxides occurred from the same enantioface of the double bond, while epoxidation of the (ii)-phenyl-substituted substrates 142c,g,i resulted in the formation of the opposite epoxide enantiomer in excess. In 2000 Hamann and coworkers reported a new saturated protected carbohydrate hydroperoxide 69b , which showed high asymmetric induction in the vanadium-catalyzed epoxidation reaction of 3-methyl-2-buten-l-ol. The ee of 90% obtained was a milestone in the field of stereoselective oxygen transfer with optically active hydroperoxides. Unfortunately, the tertiary allylic alcohol 2-methyl-3-buten-2-ol was epoxidized with low enantioselectivity (ee 18%) with the same catalytic system . 

Oxometalloporphyrins were taken as models of intermediates in the catalytic cycle of cytochrome P-450 and peroxidases. The oxygen transfer from iodosyl aromatics to sulfides with metalloporphyrins Fe(III) or Mn(III) as catalysts is very clean, giving sulfoxides, The first examples of asymmetric oxidation of sulfides to sulfoxides with significant enantioselectivity were published in 1990 by Naruta et al, who used chiral twin coronet iron porphyrin 27 as the catalyst (Figure 6C.2) [79], This C2 symmetric complex efficiently catalyzed the oxidation... 

The main methodologies developed until now for enantioselective oxidation of sulfides are effective only in the oxidation of alkyl aryl sulfoxides. Dialkyl sulfoxides on the other hand are generally oxidized with only poor selectivity. In an attempt to solve this problem, Schenk s group69 recently reported a stereoselective oxidation of metal-coordinated thioethers with DMD. The prochiral thioether is first coordinated to a chiral ruthenium complex by reaction with the chloride complexes [CpRu[(S,S)-chiraphos]Cl], 36. Diastereoselective oxygen transfer from DMD produces the corresponding sulfoxides in high yield and selectivity. The chiral sulfoxides 37 are liberated from the complexes by treatment with sodium iodide. Several o.p. aryl methyl sulfoxides have been obtained by this method in moderate to high ee (Scheme 12). 

The —N=C— bond in imines, especially Schiff bases formed from aromatic aldehydes and amines, can be epoxidized by peracids to form oxaziridines [N(0)C].326 Unlike epoxides, oxaziridines will oxygen-transfer.327 Chiral oxaziridines have been used to carry out enantioselective epoxidations,328 although these compounds are often prepared by non-peroxygen routes.329 Oxaziridines can also be rearranged to oximes or nitrones (Figure 3.85).330... 

The mechanism of the asymmetric epoxidation of allylic alcohols with the Sharpless-Katsuki catalyst is assumed to be very similar to the one described for the Halcon-ARCO process in Section 2.5. The key point is that the chiral tartrate creates an asymmetric environment about the titanium center (Figure 18). When the allylic alcohol and the t-butyl hydroperoxide bind through displacement of alkoxy groups from the metal, they are disposed in such a way as to direct oxygen transfer to a specific face of the C=C double bond. This point is crucial to maximize enantioselectivity. 

This catalytic asymmetric oxidation yielded J -methylphenylsulfoxide with a productivity of30g/l/day andane.e. >98% [35]. Chloroperoxidase is the most versatile peroxidase with better stability compared to other peroxidases, because spontaneous oxidation can be suppressed in the presence of ascorbic acid or dihydroxyfu-maric acid, and with better enantioselectivity because substrate access to the heme iron and ferryl oxygen favors stereoselective oxygen transfer [36]. Chloroperoxidase has been used for catalyzing the oxidation of cis-cydopropylmethanols with much higher enantioselectivity than trans-isomers [37]. 

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