Reduction, by: silanes

Organosilanes as Reducing Agents. The two principal categories of reductive chemistry of hydridosilanes are hydrosilylation and ionic reduction. Hydrosilylation is the catalyzed addition of a hydridosilane to a multiply bonded system. This chemistry is a principal technology in silicon—carbon bond formation. Ionic reduction by silanes, a class of chemistry more properly considered within the context of organic synthesis, is the subject of detailed reviews (132). 

Catalytic Hydrosilylation of Unsaturated Carbon-Heteroatom Bonds. Hydrosilylation of ketone produces silyl ether, which can be easily converted to alcohol via an additional hydrolysis (deprotection) step (Scheme 28). Analogously, hydrosilylation of imine leads to the formation of silylamine, which can be conveniently transformed to amine. Hydrosilylation of carbonyl (imine) group with subsequent hydrolysis is often referred to as the reduction by silanes. 

It has been known since 1954 that aldehydes or ketones are reduced by silanes to give silylated primary or secondary alcohols [41]. Reduction of ahphatic aide-... 

Reduction by hydrogen atom donors involves free radical intermediates and usually proceeds by chain mechanisms. Tri-n-butylstannane is the most prominent example of this type of reducing agent. Other synthetically useful hydrogen atom donors include hypophosphorous acid, dialkyl phosphites, and tris-(trimethylsilyl)silane. The processes that have found most synthetic application are reductive replacement of halogen and various types of thiono esters. 

Scheme 5.9 illustrates some of the conditions that have been developed for the reductive deoxygenation of alcohols. Entries 1 to 4 illustrate the most commonly used methods for generation of thiono esters and their reduction by tri-M-butylstannane. These include formation of thiono carbonates (Entry 1), xanthates (Entry 2), and thiono imidazolides (Entries 3 and 4). Entry 5 is an example of use of dimethyl phosphite as the hydrogen donor. Entry 6 uses r .s-(trimethylsilyl)silane as the hydrogen atom donor. 

To our knowledge, the first examples of catalytic non-hydrogen-mediated reductive C-C bond formation involve the reductive dimerization (telomeriza-tion) of butadiene mediated by silane, see Ref. 6-12. 

Rhodium complexes facilitate the reductive cydization of diyne species in good yield, although the product olefin geometry depends on the catalysts used. Moderate yields of -dialkylideneclopentane 169 resulted if a mixture of diyne 146 and trialkylsilane was added to Wilkinson s catalyst ClRh[PPh3]3 (Eq. 33) [101]. If, however, the diyne followed by silane were added to the catalyst, a Diels-Alder derived indane 170 was produced (Eq. 34). Cationic Rh complex, (S-BINAP)Rh(cod) BF4, provides good yields of the Z-dialkylidenecyclopentane derivatives, although in this case, terminal alkynes are not tolerated (Eq. 35) [102]. 

Normally, only a small stoichiometric excess (2-30 mol%) of silane is necessary to obtain good preparative yields of hydrocarbon products. However, because the capture of carbocation intermediates by silanes is a bimolecular occurrence, in cases where the intermediate may rearrange or undergo other unwanted side reactions such as cationic polymerization, it is sometimes necessary to use a large excess of silane in order to force the reduction to be competitive with alternative reaction pathways. An extreme case that illustrates this is the need for eight equivalents of triethylsilane in the reduction of benzyl alcohol to produce only a 40% yield of toluene the mass of the remainder of the starting alcohol is found to be consumed in the formation of oligomers by bimolecular Friedel-Crafts-type side reactions that compete with the capture of the carbocations by the silane.129... 

Aluminum chloride, used either as a stoichiometric reagent or as a catalyst with gaseous hydrogen chloride, may be used to promote silane reductions of secondary alkyl alcohols that otherwise resist reduction by the action of weaker acids.136 For example, cyclohexanol is not reduced by organosilicon hydrides in the presence of trifluoroacetic acid in dichloromethane, presumably because of the relative instability and difficult formation of the secondary cyclohexyl carbocation. By contrast, treatment of cyclohexanol with an excess of hydrogen chloride gas in the presence of a three-to-four-fold excess of triethylsilane and 1.5 equivalents of aluminum chloride in anhydrous dichloromethane produces 70% of cyclohexane and 7% of methylcyclopentane after a reaction time of 3.5 hours at... 

Benzyl Alcohols. Benzyl alcohols of nearly all kinds undergo reduction when treated with acid in the presence of organosilicon hydrides. The most obvious exception to this is the behavior of benzyl alcohol itself. It resists reduction by the action of trifluoroacetic acid and triethylsilane, even after extended reaction times.26 Reducing systems consisting of triethylsilane and sulfuric acid/acetic acid or p-toluenesullonic acid/acetic acid mixtures also fail to reduce benzyl alcohol to toluene.134 As previously mentioned, substitution of boron trifluoride for trifluoroacetic acid results in the formation of modest yields of toluene, but only when a very large excess of the silane is used in order to capture the benzyl cation intermediate and suppress Friedel-Crafts oligomerization processes.129,143... 

C-C bond formation mediated by silane.6,6a 6f With respect to the development of intramolecular variants, these seminal studies lay fallow until 1990, at which point the palladium- and nickel-catalyzed reductive cyclization of tethered 1,3-dienes mediated by silane was disclosed. As demonstrated by the hydrosilylation-cyclization of 1,3,8,10-tetraene 21a, the /rarcr-divinylcyclopentanes 21b and 21c are produced in excellent yield, but with modest stereoselectivity.46 Bu3SnH was shown to participate in an analogous cyclization.46 Isotopic labeling and crossover experiments provide evidence against a mechanism involving initial diene hydrosilylation. Rather, the collective data corroborate a mechanism involving oxidative coupling of the diene followed by silane activation (Scheme 15). 

The first rhodium-catalyzed reductive cyclization of enynes was reported in I992.61,61a As demonstrated by the cyclization of 1,6-enyne 37a to vinylsilane 37b, the rhodium-catalyzed reaction is a hydrosilylative transformation and, hence, complements its palladium-catalyzed counterpart, which is a formal hydrogenative process mediated by silane. Following this seminal report, improved catalyst systems were developed enabling cyclization at progressively lower temperatures and shorter reaction times. For example, it was found that A-heterocyclic carbene complexes of rhodium catalyze the reaction at 40°C,62 and through the use of immobilized cobalt-rhodium bimetallic nanoparticle catalysts, the hydrosilylative cyclization proceeds at ambient temperature.6... 

Method reduction of 1-bromooctane by silane catalysed by thiols. Method thiol-catalysed racemization of (5)-t-BuMePhSiH. 

Ojima has proposed a mechanism for the rhodium-catalyzed cyclization/silylformylation of enynes that invokes several of the same intermediates proposed for the rhodium-catalyzed cyclization/hydrosilylation of enynes (Scheme 7). Silylmetallation of the G=G bond of the enyne followed by / -migratory insertion of the pendant G=G bond into the resulting Rh-G bond could form rhodium cyclopentyl complex Illf. a-Migratory insertion of GO into the Rh-G bond of Illf followed by silane-promoted reductive elimination from the resulting rhodium formyl complex rVf could release the silylated cyclopentane carboxaldehyde with regeneration of silylrhodium hydride complex If (Scheme 7). 

Compound 19 was obtained by direct sulfonation of Compound 1 with concentrated H2S04 at 25°C. The dimethylamino sulfone was prepared by chlorosulfonating and aminating DiPAMP as the bis-oxide followed by silane reduction. 

Samaan used reduction at a mercury cathode to convert the phosphonium salt 33 to the phosphine (34) (79PS89). This gave the opposite stereoisomer from that available as the major product (35) from base hydrolysis followed by silane reduction. The stereochemistry of each compound was established by NMR analysis. 

A mechanism for catalysis by platinum compounds was proposed in 1965 by Chalk58) and has since been supported by increasing knowledge about silyl-metal systems and by the direct detection of Pt-Si211) and Rh-Si61,18s) complexes in the reaction mixtures. The suggested mechanism requires olefin coordination to the Pt(II) species (in the case of H2PtCl6 formed by reduction by the silicon hydride), oxidative addition of the silane, formation of an intermediate in which silicon and alkyl are both bonded to the platinum center, and reductive elimination of alkylsilane, probably assisted by coordination of more olefin ... 

---