Enantioselectivity, solvent effects

As we have seen, the Diels-Alder reaction can be both stereoselective and regioselective. In some cases, the Diels-Alder reaction can be made enantioselective Solvent effects are important in such reactions. The role of reactant polarity on the course of the reaction has been examined. Most enantioselective Diels-Alder reactions have used a chiral dienophile (e.g., 199) and an achiral diene,along with a Lewis acid catalyst (see below). In such cases, addition of the diene to the two faces of 199 takes place at different rates, and 200 and 201 are formed in different amounts. An achiral compound A can be converted to a chiral compound by a chemical reaction with a compound B that is enantiopure. After the reaction, the resulting diastereomers can be separated, providing enantiopure compounds, each with a bond between molecule A and chiral compound B (a chiral auxiliary). Common chiral auxiliaries include chiral carboxylic acids, alcohols, or sultams. In the case illustrated, hydrolysis of the product removes the chiral R group, making it a chiral auxiliary in this reaction. Asymmetric Diels-Alder reactions have also been carried out with achiral dienes and dienophiles, but with an optically active catalyst. Many chiral catalysts... 

Clearly, complete understanding of solvent effects on the enantioselectivity of Lewis-acid catalysed Diels-Alder reactions has to await future studies. For a more detailed mechanistic understanding of the origins of enantioselectivity, extension of the set of solvents as well as quantitative assessment of the strength of arene - arene interactions in these solvent will be of great help. 

The second group of studies tries to explain the solvent effects on enantioselectivity by means of the contribution of substrate solvation to the energetics of the reaction [38], For instance, a theoretical model based on the thermodynamics of substrate solvation was developed [39]. However, this model, based on the determination of the desolvated portion of the substrate transition state by molecular modeling and on the calculation of the activity coefficient by UNIFAC, gave contradictory results. In fact, it was successful in predicting solvent effects on the enantio- and prochiral selectivity of y-chymotrypsin with racemic 3-hydroxy-2-phenylpropionate and 2-substituted 1,3-propanediols [39], whereas it failed in the case of subtilisin and racemic sec-phenetyl alcohol and traws-sobrerol [40]. That substrate solvation by the solvent can contribute to enzyme enantioselectivity was also claimed in the case of subtilisin-catalyzed resolution of secondary alcohols [41]. 

By screening 53 Rhodococcus and Pseudomonas strains, an NHase-amidase biocatalyst system was identified for the production of the 2,2-dimethylcyclopropane carboxylic acid precursor of the dehydropeptidase inhibitor Cilastatin, which is used to prolong the antibacterial effect of Imipenem. A systematic study of the most selective of these strains, Rhodococcus erythropolis ATCC25 544, revealed that maximal product formation occurs at pH 8.0 but that ee decreased above pH 7.0. In addition, significant enantioselectivity decreases were observed above 20 °C. A survey of organic solvent effects identified methanol (10% v/v) as the... 

Narasaka et al.16 reported that 53 catalyzes Diels-Alder reactions of 54-type substrates with diene in the presence of 4 A molecular sieves (Scheme 5-18). A remarkable solvent effect on the enantioselectivity is observed. High enantio-selectivity is attained using mesitylene as the solvent. As shown in Scheme 5-18, the reaction of 54a with isoprene proceeds smoothly in this solvent, affording product 55a with 92% ee. Other 3-(3-substituted acryloyl)-l,3-oxazolidin-2-ones 54b-d also give good results (75-91% ee) when reacted with cyclopentadiene. 

Otto et al. studied asymmetric Diels-Alder reactions in the presence of the copper salts of glycine, L-valine, L-leucine, L-phenylalanine, L-tyrosine, l-tryptophan, and /V-a-L-tryptophan (L-abrine). The copper salt of L-abrine gave the highest enantioselectivity. Table 5 3 compares the solvent effect in this reaction, and clearly water is the best solvent among the solvent systems studied. 

The catalyst was prepared from the corresponding chiral diol and TiCl2(OPr-/)2 at room temperature in the presence of 4 A molecular sieves. Without molecular sieves, stoichiometric amounts of the titanium complex were required to obtain an equally high enantioselectivity. A remarkable solvent effect was observed. Various cycloadducts were only obtained with high optical yields when non-polar solvents were employed252,253. For example, 4-substituted 4-cyclohexene-1,2-dicarboxylate derivatives 408 were obtained with ee values ranging from 91 to 94% in the reactions of 91a, 399 and 407 with 17b in toluene/... 

TABLE 7.3 Solvent Effect on Enantioselectivity Catalysis by Copper (L-abrine) as the Lewis Acid... 

Hirose, Y., Kariya, K., Sasaki, I., Kurono, Y., Ebiike, H. and Achiwa, K., Drastic solvent effect on lipase-catalysed enantioselective hydroloysis of prochiral 1,4-dihydropyridines. 

In this report the authors describe a surprising solvent effect on enantioselectivi-ties. Alcoholic solvents afford the opposite enantiomer using the same enantiomeric series of catalyst Eq. 9. This profound effect is presumably due to hydrogen bonding in the transition state on the nucleophilic enol and/or the carbonyl acceptor Eq. 10. These electrostatic interactions can be visualized with Models E and F. Although the enantioselectivity is reversed the values remain lower than when toluene is used. 

The generality of the solvent effect on the enantioselectivity was examined in the following examples using 1,3,5-trimethylbenzene (1,3,5-TMB) as the common solvent (under unoptimized reaction conditions). 

In view of the predictive properties of the octanol-water partition coefficient, logP, in the description of enzymatic activity [79], this parameter has received much attention. However, as argued in an early but still authoritative review compiled by Carrea and coworkers [80], its usefulness in the correlation of solvent effects on enantioselectivity appears to be limited. The problem is exemplified by the entries in Figure... 

When this reasoning is applied to enantioselective enzymatic reactions, it follows that the ratio of specificity constants should not be affected by a change of medium that leads to different (but of course identical for the two enantiomers) values for the substrate activity coefficients. Indeed, solvent effects were not observed for,... 

The investigation by Wolff and coworkers into the solvent effects of the enantioselectivity of chymotrypsin-catalyzed hydrolyses [87] raises another question. The research aimed at corroborating the results reported by Jones and Mehes [91] on... 

Despite the fact that solvent effects on enzyme enantioselectivity appear to resist our efforts to rationalize their outcome using commonly accepted solvent descriptors, the effects are certainly there. An impressive example is provided in a report on the successful resolution of ds/trans-( 1 R,5 R)-bicyclo[3.2.0]hept-6-ylidene-acetate ethyl esters, intermediates in the synthesis of GABA (y-aminobutyric acid) analogs, by the Pfizer Bio transformations and Global R D groups (Scheme 2.2) [136]. From a screening protocol, CaLB was identified as a reactive catalyst for the hydrolysis of the racemic mixture of / //-os lor enantiomers with approximately equal activity for the ds- and tmns-isomers and a rather modest (E = 2.7) preference for the /Z-(lR,5R)-enantiomers. Application of medium engineering resulted in a phenomenal increase in the enantioselectivity (addition of 40% acetone, E > 200), while the ds- and trans-isomers were still converted at an almost equal rate. 

Solvent and additives. Several systems have been studied concerning solvent effects. Fig. 6 shows that quite small changes in substrate, modifier or reaction conditions can lead to rather different results. Generally, very good results are obtained in apolar solvents with dielectric constants of 2-6. But in some cases alcohols can give equally high ee s. An important conclusion is that the optimal modifier concentration is dependent on solvent, modifier and substrate type [33]. The addition of amines and weak acids can affect the enantioselectivity [31,33]. 

Enantioselectivity is highly dependent on the solvent employed. A screening of appropriate solvents for the oxidation of methyl p-tolyl sulfide showed a dramatic solvent effect (Table 6C.4) [22], The best solvents were dichloromethane and 1,2-dichloroethane, which have similar dielectric constants, that is, 1.6 and 1.44, respectively. 

H. Ebiike, and K. Achiwa, Drastic solvent effect on lipase-catalyzed enantioselective hydrolysis of prochiral 1,4-dihydropyridi-nes, Tetrahedron Lett. 1992, 33, 7157-7160. 

The HDA reaction allows for rapid access to chiral six-membered heterocyclic structures that serve as valuable intermediates in organic synthesis. The first highly enantioselective HDA reaction promoted by a chiral hydrogen bond donor was reported from the Rawal laboratory. While investigating the cycloaddition reactions of amino-siloxy diene 115, it was observed that this diene was exceptionally reactive to heterodienophiles, and underwent HDA reactions with various aldehydes at room temperature, even in the absence of any added catalyst (Scheme 6.14). Subsequent treatment of the intermediate cycloadducts (116) with acetyl chloride afforded the corresponding dihydro-4-pyrones (117) in good overall yields [101]. Further studies of this reaction revealed a pronounced solvent effect,... 

Coupling attempts conducted with (R,S)-214 led to lower enantioselection upon C-C bond formation, an observation that points to the significant role played by the relative configuration (R,R) of the binaphthyl and ethylenediamine units in promoting asymmetric induction. This complex was found to be the most efficient among several different structural variations. Solvent effects on this transformation were also studied (Table 35), with toluene and chlorobenzene giving the best results. Low solubility of the catalyst (diethyl ether and diiso-... 

Tab. 35. Solvent effects in the enantioselective oxidative dimerization of 2-naphthol (68a) by (R,R)-214.

Dirhodium(ll) tetrakis[methyl 2-pyrrolidone-5(R)-oarboxylate], Rh2(5R-MEPV)4, and its enantiomer, Rh2(5S-MEPY)4, which is prepared by the same procedure, are highly enantioselective catalysts for intramolecular cyclopropanation of allylic diazoacetates (65->94% ee) and homoallylic diazoacetates (71-90% ee),7 8 intermolecular carbon-hydrogen insertion reactions of 2-alkoxyethyl diazoacetates (57-91% ee)9 and N-alkyl-N-(tert-butyl)diazoacetamides (58-73% ee),10 Intermolecular cyclopropenation ot alkynes with ethyl diazoacetate (54-69% ee) or menthyl diazoacetates (77-98% diastereomeric excess, de),11 and intermolecular cyclopropanation of alkenes with menthyl diazoacetate (60-91% de for the cis isomer, 47-65% de for the trans isomer).12 Their use in <1.0 mol % in dichloromethane solvent effects complete reaction of the diazo ester and provides the carbenoid product in 43-88% yield. The same general method used for the preparation of Rh2(5R-MEPY)4 was employed for the synthesis of their isopropyl7 and neopentyl9 ester analogs. 

As with many catalytic systems, additives can play an important role. During optimization of the asymmetric rearrangement of cyclopentenyl tertiary ethers to chiral cyclohexenyl tertiary ethers, Hoveyda found a strong solvent effect on the enantioselectivity of the reaction using (97b). Lewis basic (see Lewis Acids Bases) additives were used to modify the catalyst since (97i) is Lewis acidic and coordination could change the equilibration of the Mo-alkyhdene isomers and, thus, could alter the enantioselectivity. Coordination of Lewis base to the metal center might also change the fit of the chiral pocket. Addition of 10 equiv (vs. substrate) of THF substantially increased the enantiomeric excess of the product in the model transformation (Table 10). ft was surmised that... 

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