Metal hydrides reduction, mechanism

The mechanism for this addition reaction resembles the mechanism for the metal hydride reduction of acid chlorides and esters discussed in Section 20.7A. The mechanism is conceptually divided into two parts nucleophilic substitution to form a ketone, followed by nucleophilic addition to form a 3° alcohol, as shown in Mechanism 20.7. 

Opposite regioselectivity to that of regular metal hydride reductions has been observed in the NaBH4 reductions of oxiranes in the presence of triethylamine under photochemical conditions (hydride attacks the more highly substituted carbon) <92CC1133>. Diborane (B2H6) likewise tends to reduce oxiranes at the sterically more hindered oxirane carbon the mechanism and stereochemistry of the diborane reduction in connection with aliphatic oxiranes has been studied <82H(l8)28l>. 

Carbonyl groups are easily reduced by metal hydrides such as sodium borohydride (NaBH4) or lithium aluminum hydride. The actual reducing agent in metal-hydride reductions is hydride ion (H ). Hydride ion adds to the carbonyl carbon, and the alkoxide ion that is formed is subsequently protonated. In other words, the carbonyl group is reduced by adding an H followed by an H. The mechanisms for reduction by these reagents are discussed in Section 18.5. 

The reduction of iminium salts can be achieved by a variety of methods. Some of the methods have been studied primarily on quaternary salts of aromatic bases, but the results can be extrapolated to simple iminium salts in most cases. The reagents available for reduction of iminium salts are sodium amalgam (52), sodium hydrosulfite (5i), potassium borohydride (54,55), sodium borohydride (56,57), lithium aluminum hydride (5 ), formic acid (59-63), H, and platinum oxide (47). The scope and mechanism of reduction of nitrogen heterocycles with complex metal hydrides has been recently reviewed (5,64), and will be presented here only briefly. 

There is no clear reason to prefer either of these mechanisms, since stereochemical and kinetic data are lacking. Solvent effects also give no suggestion about the problem. It is possible that the carbon-carbon bond is weakened by an increasing number of phenyl substituents, resulting in more carbon-carbon bond cleavage products, as is indeed found experimentally. All these reductive reactions of thiirane dioxides with metal hydrides are accompanied by the formation of the corresponding alkenes via the usual elimination of sulfur dioxide. 

Remarkable solvent effects on the selective bond cleavage are observed in the reductive elimination of cis-stilbene episulfone by complex metal hydrides. When diethyl ether or [bis(2-methoxyethyl)]ether is used as the solvent, dibenzyl sulfone is formed along with cis-stilbene. However, no dibenzyl sulfone is produced when cis-stilbene episulfone is treated with lithium aluminum hydride in tetrahydrofuran at room temperature (equation 42). Elimination of phenylsulfonyl group by tri-n-butyltin hydride proceeds by a radical chain mechanism (equations 43 and 44). 

The diversity of the substrates, catalysts, and reducing methods made it difficult to organize the material of this chapter. Thus, we have chosen an arrangement related to that used by Kaesz and Saillant [3] in their review on transition-metal hydrides - that is, we have classified the subject according to the applied reducing agents. Additional sections were devoted to the newer biomimetic and electrochemical reductions. Special attention was paid mainly to those methods which are of preparative value. Stoichiometric hydrogenations and model reactions will be discussed only in connection with the mechanisms. 

A mechanism similar to Scheme 10 was proposed, involving CO addition, followed by H20 addition (in lieu of hydroxide anion) to form a metallocarboxylic acid complex. Then, decomposition to C02 and a metal hydride was proposed, followed by hydride elimination. Table 15 provides data from reaction testing in the temperature range 140 to 180 °C. In later testing, they compared Rh and Ir complexes for the reduction of benzalacetone under water-gas shift conditions. 

Two mechanisms are conceivable for the reaction. One involves the hydrometalation of the metal hydride at alkyne followed by reductive elimination.15 Alternatively, phosphinometalation followed by protiode-metalation can occur.16 To gain insight into the mechanism, a carbonylation... 

As briefly discussed in section 1.1, and shown in Figure 1, the accepted mechanism for the catalytic cycle of hydrogenation of C02 to formic add starts with the insertion of C02 into a metal-hydride bond. Then, there are two possible continuations. The first possibility is the reductive elimination of formic acid followed by the oxidative addition of dihydrogen molecule to the metal center. The second possible path goes through the a-bond metathesis of a metal formate complex with a dihydrogen molecule. In this section, we will review theoretical investigations on each of these elementary processes, with the exception of oxidative addition of H2 to the metal center, which has already been discussed in many reviews. 

Reductions of certain aromatic ketones with metal hydrides have been shown to involve radical intermediates formed by an electron-transfer mechanism (25). For example, the reaction of aluminum hydride with dimesityl ketone in THF produced a violet solution that gave an EPR spectrum indicative of the presence of a paramagnetic species. The paramagnetic species is an intermediate in the reduction of the ketone, and is believed to be a radical cation-radical anion pair (25). 

Asymmetric transfer hydrogenation of imines catalyzed by chiral arene-Ru complexes achieves high enantioselectivity (Figure 1.34). Formic acid in aprotic dipolar solvent should be used as a hydride source. The reaction proceeds through the metal-ligand bifunctional mechanism as shown in the carbonyl reduction (Figure 1.24). 

Electrochemical reductions of CO2 at a number of metal electrodes have been reported [12, 65, 66]. CO has been identified as the principal product for Ag and Au electrodes in aqueous bicarbonate solutions at current densities of 5.5 mA cm [67]. Different mechanisms for the formation of CO on metal electrodes have been proposed. It has been demonstrated for Au electrodes that the rate of CO production is proportional to the partial pressure of CO2. This is similar to the results observed for the formation of CO2 adducts of homogeneous catalysts discussed earlier. There are also a number of spectroscopic studies of CO2 bound to metal surfaces [68-70], and the formation of strongly bound CO from CO2 on Pt electrodes [71]. These results are consistent with the mechanism proposed for the reduction of CO2 to CO by homogeneous complexes described earlier and shown in Sch. 2. Alternative mechanistic pathways for the formation of CO on metal electrodes have proposed the formation of M—COOH species by (1) insertion of CO2 into M—H bonds on the surface or (2) by outer-sphere electron transfer to CO2 followed by protonation to form a COOH radical and then adsorption of the neutral radical [12]. Certainly, protonation of adsorbed CO2 by a proton on the surface or in solution would be reasonable. However, insertion of CO2 into a surface hydride would seem unlikely based on precedents in homogeneous catalysis. CO2 insertion into transition metal hydrides complexes invariably leads to formation of formate complexes in which C—H bonds rather than O—H bonds have been formed, as discussed in the next section. 

Metal Hydrides. The simplest reactions in this group are the various catalytic reduction reactions of carbon monoxide. Methane or higher hydrocarbons, methanol or higher alcohols, and a variety of other oxygenated organic compounds may be formed, depending upon the catalyst and reaction conditions (23). There is little evidence about the mechanism of these reactions, but the initial step in every example is probably a carbon monoxide insertion into a metal hydride, followed by reduction reactions. 

---