Lithium enolates, kinetic

If the equilibrium were established rapidly, reduction of the free ketone as it formed would result in a substantial loss of product. Lithium enolates are more covalent in character than are those of sodium and potassium and consequently are the least basic of the group. This lower thermodynamic basicity appears to be paralleled by a lower kinetic basicity several workers have shown that lithium enolates are weaker bases in the kinetic sense than are those of sodium and potassium." As noted earlier, conjugated enones... 

The Michael addition of lithium enolates of amides, which have preferentially the Z geometry, under kinetically controlled conditions to a,/i-unsaturated esters provides a highly... 

A variety of chiral amides as well as oxazolidones388 and imidazolidones389,390 may easily be prepared from amino alcohols that are derived from amino acids391 392. The addition of the lithium enolates of these amides under kinetically controlled conditions to a,/i-unsaturated esters yields optically active pentanedioates. Both syn- and //-5-amino-5-oxopcntanoates may be obtained with good diastereomeric ratios192. 

Aldol Reactions of Lithium Enolates. Entries 1 to 4 in Scheme 2.1 represent cases in which the nucleophilic component is a lithium enolate formed by kinetically controlled deprotonation, as discussed in Section 1.1. Lithium enolates are usually highly reactive toward aldehydes and addition occurs rapidly when the aldehyde is added, even at low temperature. The low temperature ensures kinetic control and enhances selectivity. When the addition step is complete, the reaction is stopped by neutralization and the product is isolated. 

From these and many related examples the following generalizations can be made about kinetic stereoselection in aldol additions of lithium enolates. (1) The chair TS model provides a basis for analyzing the stereoselectivity observed in aldol reactions of ketone enolates having one bulky substituent. The preference is Z-enolate syn aldol /(-enolate anti aldol. (2) When the enolate has no bulky substituent, stereoselectivity is low. (3) Z-Enolates are more stereoselective than /(-enolates. Table 2.1 gives some illustrative data. 

The requirement that an enolate have at least one bulky substituent restricts the types of compounds that give highly stereoselective aldol additions via the lithium enolate method. Furthermore, only the enolate formed by kinetic deprotonation is directly available. Whereas ketones with one tertiary alkyl substituent give mainly the Z-enolate, less highly substituted ketones usually give mixtures of E- and Z-enolates.7 (Review the data in Scheme 1.1.) Therefore efforts aimed at increasing the stereoselectivity of aldol additions have been directed at two facets of the problem (1) better control of enolate stereochemistry, and (2) enhancement of the degree of stereoselectivity in the addition step, which is discussed in Section 2.1.2.2. 

The medicinally important )3-lactam antibiotic thienamycin (34) has stimulated several investigations into the application of the aldol reaction for the introduction of the hydroxyethyl moiety with the indicated Cg and Cg stereochemistry (29,30). Low-temperature enolization (LDA, THF) of either 35 (29a,b) or 36 (30) and subsequent condensation with excess acetaldehyde afforded the illustrated kinetic aldol adducts (eqs. [22] and [23]). In both examples the modest levels of threo diastereoselection are comparable to related data for unhindered cyclic ketone lithium enolates. Related condensations on the penam nucleus have also been reported (31). 

Detailed investigations indicate that the enolization process (LDA, THF) affords enolates 37 and 38 with at/east 97% (Z)-stereoselection. Related observations have recently been reported on the stereoselective enolization of dialkylthioamides (38). In this latter study, the Ireland-Claisen strategy (34) was employed to assign enolate geometry. Table 10 summarizes the enolization stereo selection that has been observed for both esters and amides with LDA. Complementary kinetic enolization ratios for ketonic substrates are included in Table 7. Recent studies on the role of base structure and solvent are now beginning to appear in the literature (39,40), and the Ireland enolization model for lithium amide bases has been widely accepted, A tabular survey of the influence of the ester moiety (ORj) on a range of aldol condensations via the lithium enolates is provided in Table 11 (eq. [24]). Enolate ratios for some of the condensations illustrated may be found in Table 10. It is apparent from these data that ( )-enolates derived from alkyl propionates (Rj = CH3, t-C4H9) exhibit low aldol stereoselectivity. In contrast, the enolates derived from alkoxyalkyl esters (Rj = CHjOR ) exhibit 10 1 threo diastereo-... 

The kinetic aldol diastereoselection observed for a range of amide lithium enolates is reported in Table 12. It is significant that the... 

Earlier studies had demonstrated that such enolates would participate in aldol condensations with aldehydes however, the stereochemical aspects of the reaction were not investigated (68). For the cases summarized in Table 25, the zirconium enolates were prepared from the corresponding lithium enolates (eq. [54]). Control experiments indicated that no alteration in enolate geometry accompanies this ligand exchange process, and that the product ratio is kinetically controlled (35). From the cases illustrated, both ( )-enolates (entries A-E) and (Z)-enolates (entries F-H) exhibit predominant kinetic erythro diastereoselection. Although a detailed explanation of these observations is clearly speculative, certain aspects of a probable... 

In the aldol-Tishchenko reaction, a lithium enolate reacts with 2 mol of aldehyde, ultimately giving, via an intramolecular hydride transfer, a hydroxy ester (51) with up to three chiral centres (R, derived from rYhIO). The kinetics of the reaction of the lithium enolate of p-(phenylsulfonyl)isobutyrophenone with benzaldehyde have been measured in THF. ° A kinetic isotope effect of fee/ o = 2.0 was found, using benzaldehyde-fil. The results and proposed mechanism, with hydride transfer rate limiting, are supported by ab initio MO calculations. 

The reactivity of lithium enolates has been explored in a theoretical study of the isomers of C2H30Li, such as the lithium enolate, the acyl lithium, and the a-lithio enol. Imides containing a chiral 2-oxazolidine have been employed for enantioselective protonation of prochiral enolates.A degree of kinetic control of the product E/Z-enolate ratio has been reported for the lithiation of 3,3-diphenylpropiomesitylene, using lithium amides/alkyls. " °... 

The mechanism of the aldol-Tishchenko reaction has been probed by determination of kinetics and isotope effects for formation of diol-monoester on reaction between the lithium enolate of p-(phenylsulfonyl)isobutyrophenone (LiSIBP) and two molecules of benzaldehyde. ". The results are consistent with the formation of an initial lithium aldolate (25) followed by reaction with a second aldehyde to form an acetal (26), and finally a rate-limiting intramolecular hydride transfer (Tishchenko... 

In this study, benzaldehyde and benzaldehyde-methyllithium adduct were fully optimized at HF/6-31G and their vibrational frequencies were calculated. The authors used MeLi instead of lithium pinacolone enolate, since it was assumed that the equilibrium IBs are not much different for the MeLi addition and lithium enolate addition. Dehalogena-tion and enone-isomerization probe experiments detected no evidence of a single electron transfer to occur during the course of the reaction. The primary carbonyl carbon kinetic isotope effects and chemical probe experiments led them to conclude that the reaction of lithium pinacolone enolate with benzaldehyde proceeds via a polar mechanism. 

In 1998, Hasanayn and Streitwieser reported the kinetics and isotope effects of the Aldol-Tishchenko reaction . They studied the reaction between lithium enolates of isobu-tyrophenone and two molecule of beuzaldehyde, which results iu the formation of a 1,3-diol monoester after protonation (Figure 28). They analyzed several aspects of this mechanism experimentally. Ab initio molecular orbital calculatious ou models are used to study the equilibrium and transition state structures. The spectroscopic properties of the lithium enolate of p-(phenylsulfonyl) isobutyrophenone (LiSIBP) have allowed kinetic study of the reaction. The computed equilibrium and transition state structures for the compounds in the sequence of reactions in Figure 28 are given along with the computed reaction barriers and energy in Figure 29 and Table 6. 

A. Condensations of lithium enolates under kinetic control O... 

In the reaction of a simple ketone enolate with a chiral aldehyde, the use of a zinc enolate may offer advantages in terms of facial selectivity with respect to the use of a lithium enolate. This is exactly the result recorded in the condensation of the kinetic enolate of 2-undecanone 140 with 141, the key step in a total synthesis of (-l-)-preussin 142, a fermentation product with antifungal and antibacterial activity (equation 77)169. While 2-undecanone Li enolate did not display stereocontrol when added to 141, an acceptable syn diastereoselectivity was displayed by the Zn enolate 140. 

A new method of kinetically controlled generation of the more substituted enolate from an unsymmetrical ketone involves precomplexation of the ketone with aluminium tris(2,6-diphenylphenoxide) (ATPH) at —78°C in toluene, followed by deprotonation with diisopropylamide (LDA) highly regioselective alkylations can then be performed.22 ATPH has also been used, through complexation, as a carbonyl protector of y./)-unsaturated carbonyl substrates during regioselective Michael addition of lithium enolates (including dianions of /i-di carbonyl compounds).23... 

Under conditions of kinetic control, the mixed Aldol Addition can be used to prepare adducts that are otherwise difficult to obtain selectively. This process begins with the irreversible generation of the kinetic enolate, e.g. by employing a sterically hindered lithium amide base such as LDA (lithium diisopropylamide). With an unsymmetrically substituted ketone, such a non-nucleophilic, sterically-demanding, strong base will abstract a proton from the least hindered side. Proton transfer is avoided with lithium enolates at low temperatures in ethereal solvents, so that addition of a second carbonyl partner (ketone or aldehyde) will produce the desired aldol... 

---