Furans Friedel-Crafts alkylation

Alkylation of furan and thiophene has been effected with alkenes and catalysts such as phosphoric acid and boron trifluoride. In general, Friedel-Crafts alkylation of furans or thiophenes is not preparatively useful, partly because of polymerization by the catalyst and partly because of polyalkylation. 

Naphthalene and other fused ring compounds are so reactive that they react with the catalyst, and therefore tend to give poor yields in Friedel-Crafts alkylation. Heterocyclic rings are also tend to be poor substrates for the reaction. Although some furans and thiophenes have been alkylated, a true alkylation of a pyridine or a quinoline has never been described.However, alkylation of pyridine and other nitrogen heterocycles can be accomplished by a free radical (14-23) and by a nucleophilic method (13-15). 

In 2004, Terada and coworkers reported the first asymmetric phosphoric acid-catalyzed Friedel-Crafts alkylation (Scheme 8). Aldimines 11 reacted with commercially available 2-methoxy furan (20) in the presence of BINOL phosphate (/ )-3q (2 mol%, R = S.S-MeSj-C Hj) to provide access to A-Boc-protected 2-furyl amines 21 in high yields (80-96%) and enantioselectivities (86-97% ee) [19]. 

Scheme 8 Friedel-Crafts alkylation of 2-methoxy furan...

The range of preparatively useful electrophilic substitution reactions is often limited by the acid sensitivity of the substrates. Whereas thiophene can be successfully sulfonated in 95% sulfuric acid at room temperature, such strongly acidic conditions cannot be used for the sulfonation of furan or pyrrole. Attempts to nitrate thiophene, furan or pyrrole under conditions used to nitrate benzene and its derivatives invariably result in failure. In the case of sulfonation and nitration milder reagents can be employed, i.e. the pyridine-sulfur trioxide complex and acetyl nitrate, respectively. Attempts to carry out the Friedel-Crafts alkylation of furan are often unsuccessful because the catalysts required cause polymerization. 

As indicated from computational studies, the catalyst-activated iminium ion MM3-2 was expected to form with only the (E)-conformation to avoid nonbonding interactions between the substrate double bond and the gem-dimethyl substituents on the catalyst framework. In addition, the benzyl group of the imidazolidinone moiety should effectively shield the iminium-ion Si-face, leaving the Re-face exposed for enantioselective bond formation. The efficiency of chiral amine 1 in iminium catalysis was demonstrated by its successful application in several transformations such as enantioselective Diels-Alder reactions [6], nitrone additions [12], and Friedel-Crafts alkylations of pyrrole nucleophiles [13]. However, diminished reactivity was observed when indole and furan heteroaromatics where used for similar conjugate additions, causing the MacMillan group to embark upon studies to identify a more reactive and versatile amine catalyst. This led ultimately to the discovery of the second-generation imidazolidinone catalyst 3 (Fig. 3.1, bottom) [14],... 

Uraguchi D, Sorimachi K, Terada M (2004) Organocatalytic asymmetric aza-Friedel-Crafts alkylation of furan. J Am Chem Soc 126 11804-11805 Uraguchi D, Terada M (2004) Chiral Brpnsted acid-catalyzed direct Mannich reactions via electrophilic activation. J Am Chem Soc 126 5356-5357 Vachal P, Jacobsen EN (2000) Enantioselective catalytic addition of HCN to ketoimines. Catalytic synthesis of quaternary amino acids. Org Lett 2 867-870... 

A new investigation of the Friedel-Crafts alkylation of 2-furoic esters with sec-butyl bromide (using AIC1S in CS2) yielded a mixture of 43% 5-other conditions, even furans which are not negatively substituted can be successfully alkylated. In this way 2-methyl- and 2-ethyIfuran condense with mesityl oxide in the presence of strong sulfuric acid129,130 (see also similar reactions mentioned in Sections III,B, III,C, and... 

Friedel-Crafts Alkylation Reactions. The activation of glyoxylate esters,trifluoromethyl pyruvate esters, and unsaturated a-ketoesters by catalyst 2 converts these materials into effective electrophiles for asymmetric Friedel-Crafts alkylation reactions with activated arenes (eqs 16 and 17). In fact, bis(triflate) (2) is far superior to tbe bis(hexafluoroantimonate) complex at catalyzing the enantioselective alkylation of benzene derivatives. Aniline and anisole derivatives both give the reaction, as do heterocyclic aromatic compounds such as indole and furan. 

Isopropylation of toluene by isopropyl halo- and alkyl-sulfonates (equation 54) has been performed by Olah et al. A variety of cattdysts, such as AlCb, AlCb-MeNOa and Nafion-H were employed, and the isomer distribution (o, m, p) in the product was determined. Sartori et al have recently reported an unusual Friedel-Crafts alkylation of lithium phenolates with ethyl pyruvate in the presence of AlCb to afford a-(2-hydroxyphenyl)ethyl lactates (22), which are the precursors of 3-methyl-2,3-dihydrobenzo-furan-3-ols (23 Scheme 6). 

Traditional Friedel-Crafts alkylation is not generally practicable in the fnran series, partly becanse of catalyst-indnced polymerisation and partly because of polyalkylation. Instances of preparatively nseful reactions inclnde prodnction of 2,5-di-i-bntylfuran from furan or fnroic acid and the isopropylation of methyl fnroate with donble snbstitntion, at the 3- and 4-positions. " ... 

Terada and co-workers reported the aza-Friedel-Crafts alkylation of furans to aldimines by means of 2 mol% of 21h (Scheme 10.39) [82, 83]. 

The Friedel-Crafts alkylation and acylation reactions have become important methods for the synthesis of substituted furans. The most useful reactions employ chiral catalysts to generate products in good yield and with high... 

The diastereoselective [4 + 3] cycloaddition between 2,5-disubstituted furans and vinylthionium ions was achieved (140L4476). The vinylthio-nium ion was generated either from a ort/io-phenylethynylbenzoyl allylic ester in the presence of a gold catalyst or from the allylic alcohol with a Bronsted acid. However, using 2-substituted furans led predominantly to the formation of Friedel-Crafts alkylated products. 

Furans represent an important class of electron-rich heterocycles which are useful intermediates in synthetic chemistry and are broadly found as structural motifs of many natural products and pharmaceutically important substances [333]. Since furans are generally less nucleophilic than indoles and pyrroles, their catalytic enantioselective Friedel-Crafts-type conjugate addition has been much less developed so far. Very recently Harada et al. have developed a catalytic system able to achieve good enantioselectivities in the Friedel-Crafts alkylation of electron-rich furans with acychc a,p-unsaturated ketones [334]. As depicted in Scheme 2.117, a//o-threonine-derived oxazaborolidinone 190 (10 mol%) in the presence of V,V-dimethyl benzylamine (10 mol%) as cocatalyst in ether at -40°C, is an efficient catalytic system for the reaction affording the corresponding functionalized furans with good yields and enantioselectivities. 

Scheme 4.2 Friedel-Crafts alkylation of thiophene P<=S), furan (X=0) and N-methylpyrrole (X=N-Me).

The Friedel-Crafts alkylation of furans with P-nitrostyrene was promoted by lithium perchlorate in diethyl ether (13TL6776). 

For selected pioneering examples, see (a) D. Uraguchi, K. Sorimachi, M. Terada, J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2004, 126, 11804-11805. Organocatalytic asymmetric aza-Friedel-Crafts alkylation of furan. (b) T. Akiyama, H. Morita, J. Itoh, K. Fuchibe, Org. Lett. 2005, 7, 2583-2585. Chiral Br0nsted acid catalyzed enantioselective hydrophosphonylation of imines asymmetric synthesis of a-amino phosphonates. 

---