Enol ester epoxide rearrangement

Shi and coworkers reported an efficient kinetic resolution of racemic enol ester epoxides via a BINOL-Ti-catalyzed rearrangement process [242]. Both enantioen-riched enol ester epoxides and a-acyloxy ketones can be obtained through this... 

When this reaction sequence is applied to enol esters or enol ethers, the result is a-oxygenation of the starting carbonyl compound. Enol acetates form epoxides that rearrange to a-acetoxyketones. 

Disubstituted vinyl silanes are epoxidized in high ee s and enantiomerically enriched 1,1-disubstituted epoxides can be obtained via the desilylation of these epoxides e.g., 18). Allylic alcohols and conjugated dienes and enynes are effective substrates (e.g. 19 and 20). ° The epoxidations of enol ethers and enol esters were also studied. The resulting epoxides (e.g., 21) from enol esters can undergo stereoselective rearrangement to give optically active a-acyloxy ketones, (5)-22 or (i )-23, under different acidic conditions. 

These furan endoperoxides are valuable building blocks for the synthesis of di- and tetrahydrofuran derivatives, e.g., bis-epoxides, epoxy lactones, ene diones, cis-diacyloxiranes, enol esters, butenolides, and others. Furthermore, the primary [4 + 2]-cycloadducts may rearrange into 1,2-dioxetanes or 1,2-dioxolenes. ... 

The plant bufadienolide scillarenin (500) has been synthesized. The starting material was 15a-hydroxycortexone (501), which was converted into the diketone ketal (502) by cupric acetate oxidation at C(21), followed by selective ketalization and tosylate elimination. Protection at C(3) as the dienol ether, oxiran formation at C(20) with dimethylsulphonium methylide, and regeneration of the C(3)- and C(21)-oxo-groups by acid hydrolysis then provided (503). Selective reaction at C(21) with the sodium salt of diethyl methoxycarbonyl-methylphosphonate, and boron trifluoride rearrangement of the epoxide ring to the aldehydo-unsaturated ester (504), was followed by enol lactonization to the bufadienolide (505). This was converted, in turn, to scillarenin (500) via the 14,15-bromohydrin, by standard reactions. Unsubstituted bufadienolides have also been prepared by the same method. 

Therefore several reactions were subjected to various antibody catalyses, e. g., ester and enol ether cleavage, transesteiification, ketone reduction. Cope rearrangement, ring closure via epoxide opening, or Diels-Alder cycloaddition [74, 75]. An exceptional reaction is the antibody-catalyzed Robinson annulation of triketone 28 to the Wieland-Miescher ketone 29 on a preparative scale. Surprisingly, even the alkylation of diketone 27 with methyl vinyl ketone was catalyzed by the same antibody, but at moderate rates (Scheme 15) [76]. 

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