Lithium nitriles

In the first method a secondary acetylenic bromide is warmed in THF with an equivalent amount of copper(I) cyanide. We found that a small amount of anhydrous lithium bromide is necessary to effect solubilization of the copper cyanide. Primary acetylenic bromides, RCECCH Br, under these conditions afford mainly the acetylenic nitriles, RCsCCHjCsN (see Chapter VIII). The aqueous procedure for the allenic nitriles is more attractive, in our opinion, because only a catalytic amount of copper cyanide is required the reaction of the acetylenic bromide with the KClV.CuCN complex is faster than the reaction with KCN. Excellent yields of allenic nitriles can be obtained if the potassium cyanide is added at a moderate rate during the reaction. Excess of KCN has to be avoided, as it causes resinifi-cation of the allenic nitrile. In the case of propargyl bromide 1,1-substitution may also occur, but the propargyl cyanide immediately isomerizes under the influence of the potassium cyanide. 

The most general synthetic route to ketones uses the reaction of carboxylic acids (or their derivatives) or nitriles with organometallic compounds (M.J. Jorgenson, 1970). Lithium car-boxylates react with organolithium compounds to give stable gem-diolates, which are decom-... 

The conversion of carboxylic acid derivatives (halides, esters and lactones, tertiary amides and lactams, nitriles) into aldehydes can be achieved with bulky aluminum hydrides (e.g. DIBAL = diisobutylaluminum hydride, lithium trialkoxyalanates). Simple addition of three equivalents of an alcohol to LiAlH, in THF solution produces those deactivated and selective reagents, e.g. lithium triisopropoxyalanate, LiAlH(OPr )j (J. Malek, 1972). 

Reduction of an azide a nitrile or a nitro compound furnishes a primary amine A method that provides access to primary secondary or tertiary amines is reduction of the carbonyl group of an amide by lithium aluminum hydride... 

AletalHydrides. Metal hydrides can sometimes be used to prepare amines by reduction of various functional groups, but they are seldom the preferred method. Most metal hydrides do not reduce nitro compounds at all (64), although aUphatic nitro compounds can be reduced to amines with lithium aluminum hydride. When aromatic amines are reduced with this reagent, a2o compounds are produced. Nitriles, on the other hand, can be reduced to amines with lithium aluminum hydride or sodium borohydride under certain conditions. Other functional groups which can be reduced to amines using metal hydrides include amides, oximes, isocyanates, isothiocyanates, and a2ides (64). 

Only one example of this type has been reported. Cyclization of a-(acylmethoxy-imino)nitriles in the presence of lithium hydroxide provides a convenient synthesis... 

S-Substituted thiiranium ions react with secondary amines to give ring-opened products. Nitriles also react with thiiranium ions, probably via an open carbenium ion whose formation is favored by increasing the polarity of the medium by the addition of lithium perchlorate (Scheme 79) (79ACR282). An intramolecular displacement by an amide nitrogen atom on an intermediate thiiranium ion has been invoked (80JA1954). 

Lithium aluminum hydride (LiAlH4) is the most powerful of the hydride reagents. It reduces acid chlorides, esters, lactones, acids, anhydrides, aldehydes, ketones and epoxides to alcohols amides, nitriles, imines and oximes to amines primary and secondary alkyl halides and toluenesulfonates to... 

Deuterium labeling of C-18 has also been accomplished by an alternate procedure adapted from the Nagata steroid synthesis. During the course of the total synthesis of pregnanolone, thevC-18 function is introduced in the form of a nitrile group. Reduction of this function in intermediate (247) with lithium aluminum deuteride leads to a deuterated imine (248), which upon Wolff-Kishner reduction and acid-catalyzed hydrolysis... 

Reduction of nitriles (Section 22.9) Nitriles are reduced to primary amines by lithium aluminum hydride or by catalytic hydrogenation. 

Aldehydes have also been obtained by lithium trialkoxyaluminum hydride reduction of 5-nitriles or 5-acid chlorides, and, as the thio-semicarbazones, by the McFadyen-Stevens reaction in surprisingly good yields (50-60%) considering the severity of the reaction conditions. ... 

Alpha hydrogen atoms of carbonyl compounds are weakly acidic and can be removed by strong bases, such as lithium diisopropylamide (LDA), to yield nucleophilic enolate ions. The most important reaction of enolate ions is their Sn2 alkylation with alkyl halides. The malonic ester synthesis converts an alkyl halide into a carboxylic acid with the addition of two carbon atoms. Similarly, the acetoacetic ester synthesis converts an alkyl halide into a methyl ketone. In addition, many carbonyl compounds, including ketones, esters, and nitriles, can be directly alkylated by treatment with LDA and an alkyl halide. 

Woodward s strychnine synthesis commences with a Fischer indole synthesis using phenylhydrazine (24) and acetoveratrone (25) as starting materials (see Scheme 2). In the presence of polyphosphor-ic acid, intermediates 24 and 25 combine to afford 2-veratrylindole (23) through the reaction processes illustrated in Scheme 2. With its a position suitably masked, 2-veratrylindole (23) reacts smoothly at the ft position with the Schiff base derived from the action of dimethylamine on formaldehyde to give intermediate 22 in 92% yield. TV-Methylation of the dimethylamino substituent in 22 with methyl iodide, followed by exposure of the resultant quaternary ammonium iodide to sodium cyanide in DMF, provides nitrile 26 in an overall yield of 97%. Condensation of 2-veratryl-tryptamine (20), the product of a lithium aluminum hydride reduction of nitrile 26, with ethyl glyoxylate (21) furnishes Schiff base 19 in a yield of 92%. 

The key intermediate 25 was prepared efficiently from aldehyde 23, obtained by reduction of nitrile 22 with Dibal-H. Treatment of 23 with the lithium salt of frans-diethyl cinnamylphosphonate furnishes compound 24 in 75 % yield and with a 20 1 ratio of E Z olefin stereoisomers. The stage is now set for the final and crucial operations to complete the molecular skeletons of endiandric acids A and B. 

TV-aluminum imines are another example of masked inline derivatives of ammonia. They are easily synthesized by partial reduction of nitriles with diisobutylaluminum hydride (D1BAL-H)6. Addition of lithium organic reagents to /V-aluminum iniines 7 derived from O-protected cyanohydrins 6 provides a-amino alcohols 8a and 8b in moderate yields and low to good diastereo-selectivities n 12. 

Lithium-tetradeuterido-aluminat setzt Kohlensaure-diestcr (S. 126), Carbonsauren (S. 150), Orthocarbon-saure-triester (S. 445), Carbonsaure-amide (S. 236) und Nitrile (S. Ill und 120) zu deuterierten Reduktions-produkten um. 

Vinylic copper reagents react with CICN to give vinyl cyanides, though BrCN and ICN give the vinylic halide instead." Vinylic cyanides have also been prepared by the reaction between vinylic lithium compounds and phenyl cyanate PhOCN." Alkyl cyanides (RCN) have been prepared, in varying yields, by treatment of sodium trialkylcyanoborates with NaCN and lead tetraacetate." Vinyl bromides reacted with KCN, in the presence of a nickel complex and zinc metal to give the vinyl nitrile. Vinyl triflates react with LiCN, in the presence of a palladium catalyst, to give the vinyl nitrile." ... 

In a related reaction, heating ketones in the presence of TlClsOTf leads to 1,3,5-trisubstituted arenes. " Nitriles react with 2 mol of acetylene, in the presence of a cobalt catalyst, to give 2-substituted pyridines. " Triketones fix nitrogen gas in the presence of TiCU and lithium metal to form bicyclic pyrrole derivatives. " ... 

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