Shifts 7-electrophilic Lewis acids

Sigmatropic shifts respond to attempted mechanistic experiments in true nomechanism fashion. Neither acids nor bases strongly affect the reaction, and the solvent polarity, or even the presence of solvent, is usually unimportant. The reaction proceeds quite nicely in the gas phase. It is simple to construct an arrow formalism picture of the reaction, but this device does little more than point out the overall change produced by the migration. In these figures, the arrow formalism is even more of a formalism than usual. For example, the arrows of Figure 20.33 could run in either direction, clockwise or counterclockwise. That is not true for a polar reaction in which the convention is to run the arrows from nucleophile (the Lewis base) toward the electrophile (Lewis acid). 

These examples and those in Scheme 2.6 illustrate the key variables that determine the stereochemical outcome of aldol addition reactions using chiral auxiliaries. The first element that has to be taken into account is the configuration of the ring system that is used to establish steric differentiation. Then the nature of the TS, whether it is acyclic, cyclic, or chelated must be considered. Generally for boron enolates, reaction proceeds through a cyclic but nonchelated TS. With boron enolates, excess Lewis acid can favor an acyclic TS by coordination with the carbonyl electrophile. Titanium enolates appear to be somewhat variable but can be shifted to chelated TSs by use of excess reagent and by auxiliaries such as oxazolidine-2-thiones that enhance the tendency to chelation. Ultimately, all of the factors play a role in determining which TS is favored. 

Allylic boranes such as 9-allyl-9-BBN react with aldehydes and ketones to give allylic carbinols. The reaction begins by Lewis acid-base coordination at the carbonyl oxygen, which both increases the electrophilicity of the carbonyl group and weakens the C-B bond to the allyl group. The dipolar adduct then reacts through a cyclic TS. Bond formation takes place at the 7-carbon of the allyl group and the double bond shifts.36 After the reaction is complete, the carbinol product is liberated from the borinate ester by displacement with ethanolamine. Yields for a series of aldehydes and ketones were usually above 90% for 9-allyl-9-BBN. 

Addition of a proton (e.g. p-TsOH, H2S04) or a Lewis acid leads to a more reactive electrophile. Nucleophilic attack of the alcohol gives a tetrahedral intermediate in which there are two equivalent hydroxyl groups. One of these hydroxyl groups is eliminated after a proton shift (tautomerism) to give water and the ester. 

Acceptor number (or acceptivity), AN — is an empirical quantity for characterizing the electrophilic properties (-> Lewis acid-base theory) of a solvent A that expresses the solvent ability to accepting an electron pair of a donor atom from a solute molecule. AN is defined as the limiting value of the NMR shift, S, of the 31P atom in triethylphosphine oxide, Et3P=0, at infinite dilution in the solvent, relative to n-hexane, corrected for the diamagnetic susceptibility of the solvent, and normalized ... 

It is generally admitted that skeletal transformations of hydrocarbons are catalyzed by protonic sites only. Indeed good correlations were obtained between the concentration of Bronsted acid sites and the rate of various reactions, e g. cumene dealkylation, xylene isomerization, toluene and ethylbenzene disproportionation and n-hexane cracking10 12 On the other hand, it was never demonstrated that isolated Lewis acid sites could be active for these reactions. However, it is well known that Lewis acid sites located in the vicinity of protonic sites can increase the strength (hence the activity) of these latter sites, this effect being comparable to the one observed in the formation of superacid solutions. Protonic sites are also active for non skeletal transformations of hydrocarbons e g. cis trans and double bond shift isomerization of alkenes and for many transformations of functional compounds e.g. rearrangement of functionalized saturated systems, of arenes, electrophilic substitution of arenes and heteroarenes (alkylation, acylation, nitration, etc ), hydration and dehydration etc. However, many of these transformations are more complex with simultaneously reactions on the acid and on the base sites of the solid... 

The addition of an allylsilane to an electrophile was first documented in 1948 by Sommer et al. [6]. These workers predicted that the allylsilane would react with an electrophile to generate a silicon-stabilized cationic intermediate. In 1956, Galas and co-workers demonstrated that allylsilanes undergo an allylic shift in the protiodesilylation of a cyclohexenylsilane to afford a methylidenecyclohexane [7], The first report of the reaction of allylsilanes with carbonyl compounds (1974) is also due to Galas [8]. These authors used activated substrates such as perfluoro-acetone and chloroacetone and AIGI3, GaGl3 or InGl3 as Lewis acids to promote... 

Another widely accepted viewpoint on the catalytically active sites in the silica-alumina is that they are aprotonic acids, viz., electrophilic A1 atoms with unfilled p-shell, the electron density being shifted from them towards the three surrounding 0 atoms (72). Such an electron deficiency confers on the A1 atom an afiinity towards an unshared electron pair of the basic adsorbed molecule, i.e., the properties of a Lewis acid. In fact, the addition compound, obtained on sorption of aniline vapor by a sublimed AICI3 film in a high vacuum exhibits the same shift towards the spectrum of benzene, as is the case with a protonic acid (73). 

The 13C NMR study clearly reveals that acetophenone largely shifts to the downfield when in association with BF3, while no shift is observed in trifluoroacetophenone under the same conditions. This fact suggests that no association of the markedly weak Lewis basic carbonyl group of 27 with Lewis acid is observed under the NMR analysis conditions. The nonfluorinated carbonyl group associates strongly with Lewis acid to enhance the electrophilic reactivity, while the corresponding fluorinated one does not (Scheme 1.19) [ 8]. 

Allylsilanes are very stable thermally with respect to allylic shift of the silyl group and regioisomeric allylsilanes are therefore very reliable in the regiospecificity of their Lewis acid catalyzed reactions (Scheme 1), the electrophile always bonding to the terminus of the allyl unit remote from the silyl group. In contrast, fluoride-catalyzed reactions are not regiospecific (Scheme 2), probably because... 

ABSTRACT. Alkynes, when activated by an electron-rich d Re, Mo or W phosphinic centre, undergo hydrogen shift reactions (to give, e.g., vinylidene species) or oxidatively add to the metal (forming alkynyl--hydrido or alkynyl complexes). These alkyne-derived products undergo 3-protonation to afford a variety of carbyne-fluoro or -chloro complexes, whereas aminocarbynes are obtained upon 3-electrophilic attack (e.g., by a protic or a Lewis acid) at isocyanides when ligating such metal sites. Mechanistic studies, by stopped-flow spectrophotometry, are also indicated. 

Lewis acid complexes of p-substituted a,p-unsaturated ketones and aldehydes are unreactive toward alkenes. Crotonaldehyde and 3-penten-2-one can not be induced to undergo ene reactions as acrolein and MVK do. 34 The presence of a substituent on the p-carbon stabilizes the enal- or enone-Lewis acid complex and sterically retards the approach of an alkene to the p-carbon. However, we have found that a complex of these ketones and aldehydes with 2 equivalents of EtAlQ2 reacts reversibly with alkenes to give a zwitterion. 34 This zwitterion, which is formed in the absence of a nucleophile, reacts reversibly to give a cyclobutane or undergoes two 1,2-hydride or alkyl shifts to irreversibly generate a p,p-disubstituted-o,p-unsaturated carbonyl compound (see Figure 19). The intermolecular addition of an enone, as an electrophile, to an alkene has been observed only rarely. The specific termination of the reaction by a series of alkyl and hydride shifts is also very unusual. 35 The absence of polymer is remarkable. 

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