Magnesium compounds transmetalation

Organolithium and -magnesium compounds. Compared with extensive studies carried out on the Ni-catalyzed transmetallation reaction of Grignard reagents[43I,432], few examples of the Pd-catalyzed reactions of Mg are... 

Preparation of allyltitaniums of the type (allyl)Ti(OiPr) 3 from the corresponding allyl-lithium or -magnesium compounds and ClTi(OiPr)3 by transmetallation and their subsequent synthetic utilization have attracted considerable interest because of the advantageous reactivity of the allyltitaniums as compared to other allylmetal complexes in terms of chemo-, regio-, and diastereoselectivity [3], The preparation of certain allyllithium or -magnesium reagents, however, is not necessarily easy, which would seem to limit the utility of this method. 

A general method for the synthesis of organomercurials is the transmetallation of mercury(n) salts with other organometalhc species. Organohthium and -magnesium compounds continue to be widely employed for the preparation of complexes with formula RHgX or HgR2 (see equation 1). 

The preparation of functionalized uracils and purines is of high interest due to the biological properties of these important classes of heterocycles [97]. Starting from various protected 5-iodouracils such as 168, the addition of iPrMgBr (—40 C, 45 min) leads to the formation of the corresponding magnesium compound 169 that can be trapped by various aldehydes, ketones and acid chlorides, leading for instance, after transmetallation to copper and reaction with benzoyl chloride to ketone 170 in 73% yield (Scheme 4.35) [98]. 

The transmetallation of lithio derivatives with either magnesium bromide or zinc chloride has been employed to increase further their range of synthetic application. While the reaction of l-methyl-2-pyrrolyllithium with iodobenzene in the presence of a palladium catalyst gives only a poor yield (29%) of coupled product, the yield can be dramatically improved (to 96%) by first converting the lithium compound into a magnesium or zinc derivative (Scheme 83) (81TL5319). 

Similarly to the alkyl derivatives, the most common route for arylcopper compounds is the reaction of a copper halide and aryllithium compounds (Equation (4)). Organocuprates with aryl groups are obtained by using an appropriate excess of the lithium reagent. Magnesium aryls have also been employed in transmetallation reactions with Cu(l) salts to yield both arylcopper compounds and arylcuprates (Equations (5) and (6)). 

The addition of carbonyl compounds towards lithiated 1-siloxy-substituted allenes does not proceed in the manner described above for alkoxyallenes. Tius and co-work-ers found that treatment of 1-siloxy-substituted allene 67 with tert-butyllithium and subsequent addition of aldehydes or ketones led to the formation of ,/i-unsaturated acyl silanes 70 (Scheme 8.19) [66]. This simple and convenient method starts with the usual lithiation of allene 67 at C-l but is followed by a migration of the silyl group from oxygen to C-l, thus forming the lithium enolate 69, which finally adds to the carbonyl species. Transmetalation of the lithiated intermediate 69 to the corresponding zinc enolate provided better access to acylsilanes derived from enolizable aldehydes. For reactions of 69 with ketones, transmetalation to a magnesium species seems to afford optimal results. 

Asymmetric deprotonation of the achiral oxazolidine iV-Boc-4,4-dimethyl-l,3-oxazolidine with s-BuLi-(—)-sparteine affords a lithium derivative that adds unselectively to aldehydes. However, the transmetalation from lithium to magnesium, and addition of the resulting Grignard to benzaldehyde occurs with 90% diastereoselectivity and 93% enantioselectivity. The authors speculate that deprotonation and lithiation occur stereoselectively to give the R organolithium compound, and subsequent transmetalation and addition to benzaldehyde proceed with retention (Scheme 40). 

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