Asymmetric Friedel-Crafts reaction

Friedel-Crafts reaction on unactIvated systems Asymmetric hydramination... 

Asides from the application of imines on conjugate addition reactions, Deng [87, 88] reported the first asymmetric chiral thiourea catalyzed Friedel-Crafts reaction of indoles with iV-tosyl imines (Scheme 35). The reaction was receptive to various aromatic, heteroaromatic, and aliphatic imines in good yield and high enantioselec-tivity (Scheme 36). 

The Friedel-Crafts reaction is one of the most important and versatile tools for the formation of carbon-carbon bonds in the synthesis of substituted aromatic and heteroaromatic compounds present in numerous natural products and drugs. Catalytic asymmetric variants using either metal complexes or organic molecules attracted considerable attention over the last few years. 

In the same year, Enders and coworkers reported an asymmetric one-pot, two-step synthesis of substituted isoindolines 159 in the presence of chiral A-triflyl phosphoramide (R)-Ae (10 mol%, R = d-NO -C H ) (Scheme 67) [87]. The cascade was triggered by a Brpnsted acid-catalyzed aza-Friedel-Crafts reaction of indoles 29 and A-tosyliminoenoates 160 followed by a DBU-mediated aza-Michael cyclization of intermediates 161 to afford the isoindolines 159 in high yields (71-99%) and short reaction times (10 min to 4 h) along with good enantioselectivities (52-90% ee). Longer reaction times (16 h to 10 days) caused increasing formation of the bisindole byproduct 162 (Scheme 68) along with amplified optical purity of isoindolines 159. 

Ricci and co-workers introduced a new class of amino- alcohol- based thiourea derivatives, which were easily accessible in a one-step coupling reaction in nearly quanitative yield from the commercially available chiral amino alcohols and 3,5-bis(trifluoromethyl)phenyl isothiocyanate or isocyanate, respectively (Figure 6.45) [307]. The screening of (thio)urea derivatives 137-140 in the enantioselective Friedel-Crafts reaction of indole with trans-P-nitrostyrene at 20 °C in toluene demonstrated (lR,2S)-cis-l-amino-2-indanol-derived thiourea 139 to be the most active catalyst regarding conversion (95% conv./60h) as well as stereoinduction (35% ee), while the canditates 137, 138, and the urea derivative 140 displayed a lower accelerating effect and poorer asymmetric induction (Figure 6.45). The uncatalyzed reference reaction performed under otherwise identical conditions showed 17% conversion in 65 h reaction time. 

Thiourea catalyst 139 was also screened in the asymmetric Friedel-Crafts reaction between 2-naphthol trans-nitrostyrene (73% yield 0% ee 18 h in toluene at -20 °C and 10 mol%) [277], in the asymmetric aza-Michael reaction of O-benzyl-hydroxylamine to chalcone (72% conv. 19% ee 72 h in toluene at 20 °C and 20mol% catalyst loading) [293], and in the asymmetric Morita-BayUs-HiUman [176, 177] reaction between cyclohexenecarbaldehyde and 2-cyclohexene-l-one (20% yield 31% ee 46 h at rt and 20mol% DABCO and 139) [310]. In aU these transformations, thiourea 139 proved to be not competitive to the organocatalysts probed for these transformations under identical screening conditions and thus was not employed in the optimized protocols. 

Fluoral hydrate and hemiacetals are industrial products. They are stable liquids that are easy to handle, and they react as fluoral itself in many reactions. Thus, in the presence of Lewis acids, they react in Friedel-Crafts reactions. They also react very well with organometallics (indium and zinc derivatives) and with silyl enol ethers.Proline-catalyzed direct asymmetric aldol reaction of fluoral ethyl hemiac-etal with ketones produced jS-hydroxy-jS-trifluoromethylated ketones with good to excellent diastereo- (up to 96% de) and enantioselectivities. With imine reagents, the reaction proceeds without Lewis acid activation. The use of chiral imines affords the corresponding 8-hydroxy ketones with a 60-80% de (Figure 2.49). ° ... 

Asymmetric microbial oxidation afforded the (-)-epoxide which has been explored as a building block ring opening reactions with organometallic nucleophiles, and via Friedel-Crafts reactions have been reported. [226,227]. A non-biotransformative approach to this epoxide has also been described [228]. Copper(II)-catalysed oxidative hydrolysis (Eq. 72) affords a lactic acid analogue in high enantiomeric purity [229]. 

Sertraline (16) is an antidepressant that inhibits the uptake of serotonin in the central nervous system.148 It is marketed by Pfizer under the name Zoloft.149 One methodology that can be used relies on an asymmetric reduction (see also Chapter 16) (Scheme 31.11).150-156 The lactone can be used as a chiral starting material for the Friedel-Crafts reaction. The established stereogenic center in the tetralone controls the reduction of the imine.157 The alternative is a resolution approach (Scheme 31.12).148-153-158-161... 

Kadyrov R, Riermeier TH (2003) Highly enantioselective hydrogen-transfer reductive amination catalytic asymmetric synthesis of primary amines. Angew Chem Int Ed Engl 42 5472-5474 Kang Q, Zhao ZA, You SL (2007) Highly enantioselective Friedel-Crafts reaction of indoles with imines by a chiral phosphoric acid. J Am Chem Soc 129 1484-1485... 

The 3-indolyl methanamine structural motif 503 is embedded in numerous indole alkaloids and synthetic indole derivatives . An efficient catalytic asymmetric Friedel-Crafts reaction of indoles 501 with imines 502 provides a direct, convergent, and versatile method for the highly enantioselective construction of 3-indolyl methanamines 503 from readily accessible achiral precursors (Scheme 101) <2006JA8156 and references therein>. 

Chiral titanium complexes are also employed as effective asymmetric catalysts for other carbon-carbon bond-forming reactions, for example addition of diketene (Sch. 66) [154c,162], Friedel-Crafts reaction (Sch. 67) [163] (Sch. 68) [164], iodocar-bocyclization (Sch. 69) [165], Torgov cyclization (Sch. 70) [166], and [2 -i- 1] cycloaddition (Sch. 71) [167]. Asymmetric functional group transformations can also be catalyzed by chiral titanium complexes. These transformations, for example the Sharpless oxidation [168] or hydride reduction [169] are, however, beyond the scope of this review because of space limitations. Representative results are, therefore, covered by the reference list. 

Jorgensen, K. A. Asymmetric Friedel-Crafts reactions Cataiytic enantioselective addition of aromatic and heteroaromatic C-H bonds to activated aikenes, carbonyi compounds, and imines. Synthesis 2003,1117-1125. 

Deng and coworkers also found that the bifunctional quinidine- or quinine-based thioureas 36 and 40 effectively catalyze the asymmetric Friedel-Crafts reaction of indoles with a variety of aromatic and alkyl-substituted aldimine derivatives 159. Both enantiomeric forms of the products 160 were obtained with uniformly high... 

The asymmetric Friedel-Crafts reaction was also studied, but the ee was usually low [8]. 

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