Enantioselectivity in epoxidations

Figure 16 Glycidol (A) and other allylic alcohols f B and C) giving good enantioselectivities in epoxidation.

Since cbiral sulfur ylides racemize rapidly, they are generally prepared in situ from chiral sulfides and halides. The first example of asymmetric epoxidation was reported in 1989, using camphor-derived chiral sulfonium ylides with moderate yields and ee (< 41%) Since then, much effort has been made in tbe asymmetric epoxidation using sucb a strategy without a significant breakthrough. In one example, the reaction between benzaldehyde and benzyl bromide in the presence of one equivalent of camphor-derived sulfide 47 furnished epoxide 48 in high diastereoselectivity (trans cis = 96 4) with moderate enantioselectivity in the case of the trans isomer (56% ee). ... 

The Jacobsen-Katsuki epoxidation reaction has found wide synthetic utility in both academia and industrial settings. As described previously, the majority of olefin classes, when conjugated, undergo Mn(salen)-catalyzed epoxidation in good enantioselectivity. In this section, more specific synthetic utilities are presented. 

Metzner et al. also prepared the selenium analogue 17 of their C2 symmetric chiral sulfide and tested it in epoxidation reactions (Scheme 1.6) [8]. Although good enantioselectivities were observed, and a catalytic reaction was possible without the use of iodide salts, the low diastereoselectivities obtained prevent it from being synthetically useful. 

Allylic alcohols can be converted to epoxy-alcohols with tert-butylhydroperoxide on molecular sieves, or with peroxy acids. Epoxidation of allylic alcohols can also be done with high enantioselectivity. In the Sharpless asymmetric epoxidation,allylic alcohols are converted to optically active epoxides in better than 90% ee, by treatment with r-BuOOH, titanium tetraisopropoxide and optically active diethyl tartrate. The Ti(OCHMe2)4 and diethyl tartrate can be present in catalytic amounts (15-lOmol %) if molecular sieves are present. Polymer-supported catalysts have also been reported. Since both (-t-) and ( —) diethyl tartrate are readily available, and the reaction is stereospecific, either enantiomer of the product can be prepared. The method has been successful for a wide range of primary allylic alcohols, where the double bond is mono-, di-, tri-, and tetrasubstituted. This procedure, in which an optically active catalyst is used to induce asymmetry, has proved to be one of the most important methods of asymmetric synthesis, and has been used to prepare a large number of optically active natural products and other compounds. The mechanism of the Sharpless epoxidation is believed to involve attack on the substrate by a compound formed from the titanium alkoxide and the diethyl tartrate to produce a complex that also contains the substrate and the r-BuOOH. ... 

The mesoporous character of MCM-41 overcomes the size limitations imposed by the use of zeolites and it is possible to prepare the complex by refluxing the chiral ligand in the presence of Mn +-exchanged Al-MCM-41 [34-36]. However, this method only gives 10% of Mn in the form of the complex, as shown by elemental analysis, and good results are only possible due to the very low catalytic activity of the uncomplexed Mn sites. The immobihzed catalyst was used in the epoxidation of (Z)-stilbene with iodosylbenzene and this led to a mixture of cis (meso) and trans (chiral) epoxides. Enantioselectivity in the trans epoxides was up to 70%, which is close to the value obtained in solution (78% ee). However, this value was much lower when (E)-stilbene was used (25% ee). As occurred with other immobilized catalysts, reuse of the catalyst led to a significant loss in activity and, to a greater extent, in enantioselectivity. 

Finally, with the aim of discovering novel chiral oxomolybdenum catalysts able to perform enantioselective alkene epoxidations, Kuhn et al. have reported the exploration of the catalytic behaviour of a series of dioxomolybdenum(VI) complexes with chiral cw-8-phenylthiomenthol ligands derived from ( + )-pulegone. Therefore, the epoxidation of c -p-methylstyrene using t-butyl-hydroperoxide as the oxidant and performed in the presence of ( + )-(2i ,5i )-2-[1-methyl-l-(phenylthio)ethyl]-5-methylcyclohexanone oxime as the ligand, did not produce, however, a significant optical induction in these conditions. 

A combination of DAT and a metal alkoxide other than titanium alkoxide serves as a poor catalyst for the epoxidation of allylic alcohols. However, the combination of DAT and silica-supported tantalum alkoxides (2a) and (2b) prepared from Ta(=CHCMe3)(CH2Cme3)3 and silica(5oo) shows high enantioselectivity in the epoxidation of E-allylic alcohols, though chemical yields are not very great (Scheme 4).3... 

In 2001, Ahn et al. introduced a Mn(salen) possessing a structurally related binaphthyl unit, and also achieved high enantioselectivity in the epoxidation of conjugated olefins.103... 

G. Bellucci, C. Chiappe, F. Marioni, M. Benetti, Regio- and Enantioselectivity of the Cytosolic Epoxide Hydrolase-Catalysed Hydrolysis of Racemic Monosubstituted Alkyloxiranes ,./. Chem. Soc., Perkin Trans. 1 1991, 361 - 363 G. Bellucci, C. Chiappe, L. Conti, F. Marioni, G. Pierini, Substrate Enantioselection in the Microsomal Epoxide Hydrolase Catalyzed Hydrolysis of Monosubstituted Oxiranes. Effects of Branching of Alkyl Chains ,./. Org. Chem. 1989, 54, 5978 - 5983. 

A chiral dichlororuthenium(IV) complex of a Z)4-symmetric porphyrin, [Ru (Z)4-por )(Cl)2], has been prepared by heating [Ru (Z>4-por )(CO)(MeOH)] in CCI4. The complex is characterized by NMR (paramagnetically shifted pyrrolic protons at = 52.3 ppm), FAB-MS, and magnetic susceptibility measurement (/.teff= 3.1/.tB). It is a very active catalyst for enantioselective alkene epoxidations using 2,6-dichloropyridine A-oxide as the terminal oxidant, with a turnover number of up to 2000 the ee of the epoxides is 50-80%. The complex can be incorporated into sol-gel and turnovers of over 10" can be achieved." ... 

Although the chiral ketoiminatomanganese(lll) complexes were reported to catalyze the asymmetric aerobic alkene epoxidations, an aldehyde such as pivalaldehyde is required as a sacrihcial reducing agent. Groves reported that the dioxo(porphyrinato)ruthenium complexes 31, prepared with m-chloroperoxyben-zoic acid, catalyzed the aerobic epoxidation without any reductant. " On the basis of these reports, Che synthesized the optically active D4-porphyrin 35 and applied it to the truly aerobic enantioselective epoxidation of alkenes catalyzed by the chiral frani-dioxo (D4-porphyrinato)ruthenium(Vl) complex. The dioxoruthenium complex catalyzed the enantioselective aerobic epoxidation of alkenes with moderate to good enantiomeric excess without any reductant. In the toluene solvent, the turnovers for the epoxidation of T-(3-methylstyrene reached 20 and the ee of the epoxide was increased to 73% ee. 

Ketone 8 epoxidizes a wide range of olefins in good yields. The steric hindrance and electronegativity of the substitnents (X) at positions 3 and 3 greatly affect the epoxidation reactivity and enantioselectivity. In general, pnra-snbstituted trans-stilbenes are very effective snbstrates for the epoxidation using ketone 8 (Table 1, entries 1-8, 16-18). The enantioselectivity for the epoxidation increases as the size of the substituents increases. However, the size of the mefn-substituents had little effect on enantioselectivity. Later, Seki and coworkers extended the epoxidation scope to cinnamates using ketone 8 (Table 1, entry 26) [35, 36]. 

The use of tartrate esters was an obvious place to start, especially since both enantiomers are readily available commercially and had already found widespread application in asymmetric synthesis (Figure 11) (e.g.. Sharpless asymmetric epoxidation).23.24 Reagents 36-38 are easily prepared and are reasonably enantioselective in reactions with achiral, unhindered aliphatic aldehydes (82-86% ee) typical results are given in Figure 12.3c,h Aromatic and a,p-unsaturated aldehydes, unfortunately, give lower levels of enantioselection (55-70% e.e.). It is also interesting to note that all other C2 symmetric diols that we have examined (2,3-butanediol, 2,4-pentanediol, 1,2-diisopropylethanediol, hydrobenzoin, and mannitol diacetonide, among others) are relatively ineffective in comparison to the tartrate esters (see Table ll).25... 

Besides the chiral, secondary hydroperoxides employed by Adam and coworkers and the tertiary hydroperoxide used by Seebach, the optically active carbohydrate hydroperoxides 72, 93 and 94 have been tested by Taylor and coworkers in epoxidation reactions of the quinones 95 under basic conditions (Scheme 41). The yields of the corresponding epoxides 96 that were obtained with this type of oxidant varied from 33 to 83% and the enantioselectivities were moderate and in some cases good (23 to 82%), depending... 

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