Oxygen Functions

The achiral triene chain of (a//-rrans-)-3-demethyl-famesic ester as well as its (6-cis-)-isoiner cyclize in the presence of acids to give the decalol derivative with four chirai centres whose relative configuration is well defined (P.A. Stadler, 1957 A. Escherunoser, 1959 W.S. Johnson, 1968, 1976). A monocyclic diene is formed as an intermediate (G. Stork, 1955). With more complicated 1,5-polyenes, such as squalene, oily mixtures of various cycliz-ation products are obtained. The 18,19-glycol of squalene 2,3-oxide, however, cyclized in modest yield with picric acid catalysis to give a complex tetracyclic natural product with nine chiral centres. Picric acid acts as a protic acid of medium strength whose conjugated base is non-nucleophilic. Such acids activate oxygen functions selectively (K.B. Sharpless, 1970). 

The steroidal 4/3-acetoxy-5/J,6/l/-epoxy-2-en-l-one system 546 was converted at room temperature into the 6/3-hydroxy-2,4-dien-l-one 547 by reductive elimination of the vicinal oxygen function, and the reaction has been applied to the synthesis of withanolide[352]. 

Another group of macrocyclic ligands that have been extensively studied are the cycHc polyethers, such as dibenzo-[18]-crown-6 (5), in which the donor atoms are ether oxygen functions separated by two or three carbon atoms. The name crown ethers has been proposed (2) for this class of compounds because of the resemblance of their molecular models to a crown. Sandwich stmctures are also known in which the metal atom is coordinated with the oxygen atoms of two crown molecules. 

These compounds generally exist in carbonyl forms. The oxygen function can be converted into halogen by phosphorus halides. Reactions with electrophiles are quite complex. Thus urazole (511) reacts with diazomethane quickly to yield (512), which is more slowly converted into (513). 1-Phenylurazole gives (514) however, 4-phenylurazole yields (515). Oxadiazolinones of type (516) can be alkylated at both O- and N-atoms. 

The simplest method for the addition of a 2-carbon fragment to a 17-keto steroid while retaining an oxygen function at C-17 is via reaction with acetylene or a substituted acetylene e.g., ethoxyacetylene, chloroacetylene). Since the resulting acetylenic carbinol (which is usually obtained in excellent yield) can in turn be hydrated, reduced, rearranged, and oxidized, this reaction offers considerable synthetic possibilities. 

A variety of oxidative reagents can be used to convert 17-hydroxypregnanes containing an additional oxygen function at C-20 into 17-ketoandrostanes. Among the most widely used have been chromium trioxide, lead tetraacetate, periodic acid and sodium bismuthate. 

However, this does not explain the structural requirements for the oxygen function vicinal to the nitrite ester a-ketones, ketals and hydroxyls are cleaved, but a-acetoxyls are not. 

Probably the most widely used method for the introduction of an oxygen function at C-21 involves the bromination of a 17a-hydroxy-20-ketopregnane, followed by displacement of the halogen by acetate ... 

Acylation of various oxygen functions by use of common and commercially available fluonnated carboxylic acid denvatives such as trifluoroacetic anhydride or the corresponding acyl halides have already been discussed sufficiently in the first edition [10] Therefore only exceptional observations will be described in this section In the past 15 years, many denvatizations of various nonfluonnated oxygen compounds by fluoroacylation were made for analytical purposes. Thus Mosher s acid chlorides for example became ready-to-use reagents for the determination of the enantiomeric purity of alcohols and amines by NMR or gas-liquid chromatographic (GLC) techniques [//] (equation 1)... 

These reactions are related to the formation of pyrroles and quinolines from aminocarbonyl compounds and acetylenes (582,583) and may be contrasted with the formation of pyran derivatives by electrophilic attack on an enamine, followed by addition of an oxygen function to the imonium carbon (584-590). 

For the construction of oxygen-functionalized Diels-Alder products, Narasaka and coworkers employed the 3-borylpropenoic acid derivative in place of 3-(3-acet-oxypropenoyl)oxazolidinone, which is a poor dienophile in the chiral titanium-catalyzed reaction (Scheme 1.55, Table 1.24). 3-(3-Borylpropenoyl)oxazolidinones react smoothly with acyclic dienes to give the cycloadducts in high optical purity [43]. The boryl group was converted to an hydroxyl group stereospecifically by oxidation, and the alcohol obtained was used as the key intermediate in a total synthesis of (-i-)-paniculide A [44] (Scheme 1.56). 

---