Rearrangement processes carbanion intermediates

Carbanions play critical roles in a wide variety of reaction pathways. As stated in the Introduction, this chapter will not focus on the synthetic utility of carbanions, but will instead focus on their mechanistic significance. In this section, a sample of important reaction mechanisms that involve transient or relatively short-lived car-banion intermediates will be introduced. As you will see, the key element in these mechanisms is the ability to form a carbanion that is reasonably stable, and often the kinetics of the reactions are dominated by carbanion stability. The role of carbanion intermediates in elimination reactions will be presented in some detail as a way to illustrate some of the methods that have been developed to probe for carbanion intermediates in reaction mechanisms. Other processes including additions and rearrangement reactions will be presented in less detail, but the role of carbanion stability in these reactions will be outlined. 

Carbanions also appear as intermediates in rearrangement processes. In some cases, this involves the rearrangement from one carbanion to another, but in other cases. 

Wittig Rearrangement. There is a continuing controversy over the role of carbanion intermediates in this process. The reaction involves the formation of a carbanion at the ot-carbon of an ether leading to a rearrangement that produces an alkoxide (Eq. 19) ... 

With allylic alcohols, there is the possibility of a [2,3] variant of the Wittig rearrangement that can compete with the [1,2] rearrangement described above (Eq. 22, the indicated electron flow is for the [2,3] rearrangement). The reaction is expected to be a one-step, pericyclic process without a distinct carbanion intermediate. This rearrangement has proven to be useful synthetically because its concerted nature can lead to high stereoselectivity. ... 

Perfluoropolyenes also can rearrange to four-membered ring products upon fluoride ron or Lewis acid catalysis [112, II3, 114] (equations 46 and 47) These intramolecular cycloadditions are multistep processes involving carbanion or carbocation intermediates... 

Carbanions can take part in most of the main reaction types, e.g. addition, elimination, displacement, rearrangement, etc. They are also involved in reactions, such as oxidation, that do not fit entirely satisfactorily into this classification, and as specific—ad hoc—intermediates in a number of other processes as well. A selection of the reactions in which they participate will now be considered many are of particular synthetic utility, because they result in the formation of carbon-carbon bonds. 

Rearrangement of a-silyl oxyanions to a-silyloxy carbanions via a reversible process involving a pentacoordinate silicon intermediate is known as the [l,2]-Brook rearrangement, or [l,2]-silyl migration. 

The nucleophilicity of sulfur and its ability to stabilize a-carbanions provide sulfur compounds with unique opportunities for sigmatropic processes consecutive rearrangements are no exception. The formation of salt (140) via Sn2 alkylation of ( )-2-butenyl bromide (139) followed by deprotonation leads to the intermediate allyl vinyl ether (141) which, under the conditions of the deprotonation, undergoes a thio-Claisen rearrangement to afford thioamide (143 Scheme 10). Thermolysis of (143) at elevated temperature affords the Cope product (142) in addition to some of its deconjugated isomer. Several unique characteristics of the thio-Claisen sequence should be noted first, the heteroatom-allyl bond is made in the alkylation step, this connection teing not notrtudly practised in the parent Claisen reaction ... 

Ionization of substrates 1 and 2 leading to the symmetrically 1,1-disubstituted diastereomeric Ti-allyl complexes 3 and 4 also allows complete conversion to one product enantiomer, provided that nucleophilic attack occurs at the carbon bearing substituent R2. High enantiomeric excess may be achieved if a rapid equilibration between the two intermediate re-allyl species is established and the soft carbanion preferentially attacks one of them. Interconversion of the reactive complexes is possible via epimerization by nucleophilic attack of free palladium(O) anti to the jr-allyl complex or by n-a-n rearrangement involving the formation of a Pd-C c-bond at the symmetrically substituted allyl terminus. This process is only fast for R1 = H, due to a low degree of steric congestion or for R1 = aryl because of rc-benzyl participation. 

Syntheses of Alkylidene cyclopropanes Via the Selenonium route The selenonium route proved to be more valuable. It has been specifically designed by us to replace the deficient selenoxide route (Scheme 38). It was expected to produce alkylidene cyclopropanes by a mechanism which mimics the selenoxide elimination step but which involves a selenonium ylide in which a carbanion has replaced the oxide. Cyclopropyl selenides are readily transformed to the corresponding selenonium salts on reaction with methyl fluorosulfonate or methyl iodide in the presence of silver tetrafluoroborate in dichloromethane at 20 °C and, as expected, methylseleno derivatives are more reactive than phenyl-seleno analogs. Alkylidene cyclopropanes are, in turn, smoothly prepared on reaction of the selenium salts at 20 °C with potassium tert-butoxide in THF (Scheme 38). Mainly alkyl cyclopropenes form at the beginning of the reaction. They then slowly rearranges, in the basic medium, to the more stable alkylidene cyclopropanes( 6 kcal/mol). In some cases the complete isomerisation requires treatment of the mixture formed in the above reaction with potassium fcrt-butoxide in THF. The reaction seems to occur via a selenonium ylide rather than via a P-elimina-tion reaction promoted by the direct attack of the /crt-butoxide anion on the P-hydrogen of the selenonium salt, since it has been shown in a separate experiment that the reaction does not occur when a diphenylselenonium salt (imable to produce the expected intermediate) is used instead of the phenyl-methyl or dimethyl selenonium analogs. It has also been found that the elimination reaction is the slow step in the process, since styrene oxide is formed if the reaction is performed in the presence of benzaldehyde which traps the ylide intermediately formed... 

Interestingly, in the case of the anion-accelerated vinylcyclopentane-CP rearrangement, the involvement of ylide or 1,3-zwitterionic intermediates may facilitate the process at low temperatures and in a stereoselective manner. For example, Takeda proposed that the rearrangement of vinylcyclopropylacetates 17 using MeLi might involve the formation of a silyl-stabilized carbanion 19 which either cyclizes to form the cyclopentene product or is protonated to form the acyclic ketone product fScheme 11.191. ... 

The photocyclization of (108) to (110) is another ten-electron process, this time involving a system isoconjugate with an odd hydrocarbon anion. The first step is probably a photochemical conrotatory closure to (109). The transition state, being of anti-Huckel type in a fused 6-5 system with ten delocalized electrons, should be antiaromatic. The intermediate (109), isoconjugate with a linear C7 carbanion, was not isolated but underwent rearrangement, probably by a 1,5 sigmatropic shift via a transition state isoconjugate with the indenyl anion (111). 

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