Halocarbenes

An ingenious approach to the synthesis of steroids incorporating a tropone A ring has been developed by Birch and co-workers. Addition of dibromocarbene to 3-methoxyestra-2,5(10)-dien-17-one 17-ethylene ketal (42) gives a monodibromocarbene adduct formulated as (43) accompanied by a minor amount of a bisadduct. This confirms earlier observations that electrophilic halocarbenes add mainly to 2,3- or 2,5-dihydroanisoles at the double bond bearing the methoxyl group. 

More useful for synthetic purposes, however, is the combination of the zinc-copper couple with methylene iodide to generate carbene-zinc iodide complex, which undergoes addition to double bonds exclusively to form cyclopropanes (7). The base-catalyzed generation of halocarbenes from haloforms (2) also provides a general route to 1,1-dihalocyclopropanes via carbene addition, as does the nonbasic generation of dihalocarbenes from phenyl(trihalomethyl)mercury compounds. Details of these reactions are given below. 

Carbene itself is extremely reactive and gives many side reactions, especially insertion reactions (12-19), which greatly reduce yields. When it is desired to add CH2 for preparative purposes, free carbene is not used, but the Simmons-Smith procedure (p. 1088) or some other method that does not involve free carbenes is employed instead. Halocarbenes are less active than carbenes, and this reaction proceeds quite well, since insertion reactions do not interfere.The absolute rate constant for addition of selected alkoxychlorocarbene to butenes has been measured to range from 330 to 1 x 10 A few of the many ways in... 

Which isomer is predominantly formed depends on R, R, and on the method by which the carbene or carbenoid is generated. Most studies have been carried out on monosubstituted species (R = H), and in these studies it is found that aryl groups generally prefer the more substituted side (syn addition) while carbethoxy groups usually show anti stereoselectivity. When R = halogen, free halocarbenes show little or no stereochemical preference, while halocarbenoids exhibit a preference for syn addition. Beyond this, it is difficult to make simple generalizations. 

The photochemistry of several of the iron porphyrin halocarbene complexes Fe(TPP)(=CXY) (CXY = CCF, CBr2, CCIF. CCl(CN) and the vinylidene complex Fe(TPP)=C=CAr2 (Ar = p-C6Fl4Cl) has been studied in degassed benzene... 

In contrast to methylene, a number of the simplest triatomic halocarbenes... 

Decomposition of diazo compounds by iron porphyrins is a convenient method for the synthesis of non-heteroatom carbene-iron porphyrins [22]. Reaction of [Fe(F2o-TPP)] [F20-TPP = meso-tetrakis(pentafluorophenyl)porphyrinato dianion] with diazo compounds N2C(Ph)R (R = Ph, C02Et, C02CH2CH=CH2) under an inert atmosphere afforded complexes [Fe(F2o-TPP)C(Ph)R] in 65-70% yields (Scheme 2). Like the halocarbene complex [Fe(TPP)(CCl2)], [Fe(F2o-TPP)CPh2] reacted with Melm to afford six-coordinate species [(MeIm)Fe(F2o-TPP)CPh2] in 65% isolated yield. 

Further studies were carried out with halocarbene amides 34 and 357 Although again no direct spectroscopic signatures for specifically solvated carbenes were found, compelling evidence for such solvation was obtained with a combination of laser flash photolysis (LFP) with UV-VIS detection via pyridine ylides, TRIR spectroscopy, density functional theory (DFT) calculations, and kinetic simulations. Carbenes 34 and 35 were generated by photolysis of indan-based precursors (Scheme 4.7) and were directly observed by TRIR spectroscopy in Freon-113 at 1635 and 1650 cm , respectively. The addition of small amounts of dioxane or THF significantly retarded the rate of biomolecular reaction with both pyridine and TME in Freon-113. Also, the addition of dioxane increased the observed lifetime of carbene 34 in Freon-113. These are both unprecedented observations. 

The methods for generating these types of ions are the same as those described above for diradicals and carbenes. Eor example, the reaction of dichloromethane with O leads to the formation of CCl2. Thus, Jesinger and Squires have used CID of halocarbene anions to determine the thermochemical properties of carbynes (Eq. 5.16). ... 

The susceptibility of d6 Ru, Os, and Ir halocarbene complexes to nucleophilic substitution reactions (see Section V) can also be understood in terms of this model, e.g.,... 

Halide displacement from the carbene ligands of Ru, Os, and Ir halocarbene complexes by N-, O-, and S-based nucleophiles frequently leads to the formation of new heteroatom-substituted carbene complexes. This important class of reactivity will be discussed in more detail in Section V,D, but it is appropriate here to illustrate the scope of this method with several examples ... 

The facility with which electrophilic halocarbene complexes undergo substitution reactions makes them extremely versatile synthetic intermediates, and this section summarizes these synthetic possibilities. Scheme 3 illustrates the usefulness of RuCl2(=CCl2)(CO)(PPh3)2. When the ligands are bound to electron-rich metal centers the electrophilicity is much reduced and interaction of the M=C function with some electrophiles can be observed. 

The methods summarized by Eqs. 8 and 9 have both been applied to halocarbenes. The proton affinities obtained by ICR bracketing125 (Table 6) are consistently lower than those derived from enthalpies of formation (Table 7). The case of dichlorocarbene, with a difference in AH of 15 kcal/mol), is particularly disturbing and has been analysed in some detail.134 Notably, the PA of CCl2 from an earlier bracketing experiment126 was closer to the enthalpy-derived PA. The discrepant results from similar experiments125126 indicate that HCClJ is not a good substrate for proton transfer studies. 

Although we are not specifically concerned here with kpp and the kinedcs of carbene-pyridine ylide formation, we note that the magnitude of is directly related to the structure and reactivity of the carbene. fcpyr ranges from 105 M s-1 for ambiphilic alkoxycarbenes to 109-10I° M-1 s 1 for electrophilic halocarbenes or alkylcarbenes. Very nucleophilic carbenes (MeOCOMe) do not react with pyridine.13... 

The RIES mechanism provides a particularly good framework for several reaction systems. Examples include the C and H migrations of cyclobutyl-halocarbenes 17-F and 17-C1,28 the methyl migration and 1,3-CH insertion of t-butylchlorocarbene, 18,27 and the fragmentations of 2,2-dimethylcyclopropyl-chlorocarbene, 19,45 and tawis-f-butylcyclopropylcarbene, 20.46... 

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