Organolithium compounds with lithium carboxylates

Fig. 6.45. Chemoselective acylation of organolithium compounds with lithium-carboxylates (A). In order to generate the substrates the choice is between the deprotonation of the corresponding carboxylic acid and the addition of an organolithium compound to carbon dioxide, i.e. via C,C bond formation.

In addition to being a synthetic route to unusual graft copolymers, the metalation technique offers a way to add functional groups to the chain by reactions characteristic of organolithium compounds. Hydroxyl or carboxyl groups, for instance, can be added by treating the metalated polyisoprene or polybutadiene (22) solution with ethylene oxide or C02, respectively. The lithium alkoxide and carboxylic salt obtained (23) in... 

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-... 

Wyman, Allen and Altares (20) reported that the carbonation of poly-(styryl)lithium in benzene with gaseous carbon dioxide produced only a 60% yield of carboxylic acid the acid was contaminated with significant amounts of the corresponding ketone (dimer) and tertiary alcohol (trimer) as shown in eq. 6. A recent, careful, detailed investigation of the carbonation of polymeric organolithium compounds has... 

Since Lewis base additives and basic solvents such as tetrahydrofuran are known to deaggregate polymeric organolithium compounds, (21,23,26) it was postulated that ketone formation would be minimized in the presence of sufficient tetrahydrofuran to effect dissociation of the aggregates. In complete accord with these predictions, it was found that the carbonation of poly(styryl)lithium (eq. 9), poly(isoprenyl)-lithium, and poly(styrene-b-isoprenyl)lithium in a 75/25 mixture (by volume) of benzene and tetrahydrofuran occurs quantitatively to produce the carboxylic acid chain ends (8 ). 

Eunctionalized organolithium compounds, having a protected carboxylic acid functionality, can also be considered as masked lithium tris-homoenolates and were prepared by DTBB-catalyzed (5%) Uthiation of the corresponding )-chlorinated materials. Eor instance, compound 227 in THE at —78°C leads to the expected organoUthium intermediate 228, which reacts with a series of electrophiles present in the reaction medium... 

Acyl anions (RC(=0)M) are unstable, and quickly dimerize at temperatures >-100 °C (Section 5.4.7). These intermediates are best generated by reaction of organolithium compounds or cuprates with carbon monoxide at -110 °C and should be trapped immediately by an electrophile [344—347]. Metalated formic acid esters (R0C(=0)M) have been generated as intermediates by treatment of alcoholates with carbon monoxide, and can either be protonated to yield formic acid esters, or left to rearrange to carboxylates (R0C(=0)M —> RC02M) (Scheme 5.38) [348]. Related intermediates are presumably also formed by treatment of alcohols with formamide acetals (Scheme 5.38) [349]. More stable than acyl lithium compounds are acyl silanes or transition metal acyl complexes, which can also be used to perform nucleophilic acylations [350],... 

Obviously, only noimucleophilic bases can be employed for the formation of enolates from carbonyl and carboxyl compounds. A base is nonnucleophilic if it is very bulky. The only nonnucleophilic organolithium compounds that deprotonate carbonyl and carboxyl compounds are mesityllithium (2,4,6-trimethylphenyllithium) and trityl-lithium (triphenylmethyllithium). However, these bases do not have any significance for the generation of enolates because of the difficulties associated with their preparation and with the separation of their conjugate acid hydrocarbons. 

In the synthesis directed towards lincosamine, Szechner [32] utilized a known reaction [33] of lithium salts of carboxylic acids with organolithium compounds (Scheme 14). 

The carbonation of polymeric carbanions using carbon dioxide is one of the simplest, most useful, and widely used functionalization reactions. However, there are special problems associated with the simple carbonation of polymeric organolithium compounds. Eor example, when carbonations with high-purity, gaseous carbon dioxide are carried out in benzene solution at room temperature using standard high vacuum techniques, the carboxylated polymer is obtained in only 27-66% yield for PSLi, PILi, and poly(styrene-b-isopre-nyl)lithium. The functionalized polymer is contaminated with dimeric ketone (23-27%) and trimeric alcohol (7-50%)... 

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