Patemo-Biichi reaction mechanism

The mechanism of the Patemo-Biichi reaction is not well understood, and while a general pathway has been proposed and widely aceepted, it is apparent that it does not represent the full scope of reactions. Biichi originally proposed that the reaction occurred by light catalyzed stimulation of the carbonyl moiety 1 into an excited singlet state 4. Inter-system crossing then led to a triplet state diradical 5 which could be quenched by olefinic radical acceptors. Intermediate diradical 6 has been quenched or trapped by other radical acceptors and is generally felt to be on the reaction path of the large majority of Patemo-Biichi reactions. Diradical 6 then recombines to form product oxetane 3. 

It is evident from the exceptions noted that the mechanism proposed above does not fully capture the pathways open to the Patemo-Biichi reaction. A great deal of effort has been devoted to deconvoluting all of the possible variants of the reaction. Reactions via singlet state carbonyls, charge-transfer paths, pre-singlet exciplexes, and full electron transfer paths have all been proposed. Unfortunately, their influence on product... 

The Generally Accepted Mechanism of the Patemo-Biichi Reaction... 

The 1,5-biradicaI BRi formed during the Patemo—Biichi reaction of excited benzo-quinone B with quadricyclane Q (for the formulas, see Chart 9.4) provides one of the extremely rare examples of a short-chain biradical that produces CIDNP of the radical pair type. Extracts of the CIDNP spectra are displayed in Fig. 9.7. The occurrence of both absorption and emission in the same product is clear evidence for this mechanism of polarization generation. 

By a detailed CIDNP investigation [117a] of the Patemo-Biichi reactions of anetholes 31 with quinones 30 in polar medium earlier mechanistic hypotheses were disproved. Stationary and time-resolved experiments showed the mechanism to have the following novel features (cf. Chart XIV) Spin-correlated radical ion pairs (i.e., 30 31,+) are key intermediates for cycloadduct formation free radical ions do not play a significant role. In the singlet state, these pairs undergo back electron transfer geminate reaction of triplet pairs leads to triplet biradicals, which are the precursors to the photoproducts. 

The synthesis of oxetanes from alkenic precursors has been demonstrated and the range and scope of Patemo-Biichi photocycloadditions are broad. In general, both the reaction regioselectivity and stereoselectivity can often be predicted by considering the reaction mechanism (Section 2.4.2) for example, the directing effects of alkene substituents are readily imderstood. Synthetic applications are numerous owing to the rtq>id stereocontrolled assembly of multifimctional targets. 

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