Reduction initiated domino reactions

During the past few years, increasing numbers of reports have been published on the subject of domino reactions initiated by oxidation or reduction processes. This was in stark contrast to the period before our first comprehensive review of this topic was published in 1993 [1], when the use of this type of transformation was indeed rare. The benefits of employing oxidation or reduction processes in domino sequences are clear, as they offer easy access to reactive functionalities such as nucleophiles (e. g., alcohols and amines) or electrophiles (e. g., aldehydes or ketones), with their ability to participate in further reactions. For that reason, apart from combinations with photochemically induced, transition metal-catalyzed and enzymatically induced processes, all other possible constellations have been embedded in the concept of domino synthesis. 

A variety of natural products and pharmaceutical agents contain a tetrahydroquinoline moiety [31]. Recently, a simple and general access to these heterocycles by a so-far unknown domino reaction of aromatic nitro compounds 7-65 and 2,3-dihydrofuran mediated by indium in water has been described by Li and coworkers (Scheme 7.19) [32]. It is assumed that the process is initiated by reduction of the nitro group in 7-65 to give the aniline 7-66 on treatment with indium in... 

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