Sodium glycolate transformation

Powdered potassium hydroxide in ethylene glycol transforms at 110 °C 3-chlorotetrahydropyran (235) into a 1 3 mixture of 3,5- and 3,4-dihydro-2//-pyran. The latter component, an enether, can be selectively destroyed with acid. The same chloro compound (235) gives with potassium/sodium alloy quantitatively potassium pent-4-en-1-oxide (Scheme 1-181). 

In a typical experiment, triethylene glycol was treated with two equivalents of sodium toluenesulfonamide in dry DMF solution. After 6 h at reflux, the solution was distilled and product obtained by a standard work-up procedure. By this procedure, 9 was obtained in about 10% yield. The transformation is illustrated below as Eq. (4.10). Note also that Vogtle and his coworkers have also utilized phthalimide as a source of nitrogen in the preparation of such azacrown precursors as H2N(CH2CH2 0)2CH2CH2NH2 In such reactions, a standard hydrazine cleavage was used to remove the phthaloyl residue. 

In a similar manner, coccinelline (99) and precoccinelline (100) have been synthesized from 2,6-lutidine (351) (336,450). Thus, treatment of the monolithium derivative (153) of 351 with P-bromopropionaldehyde dimethylacetal gave an acetal, which was converted to the keto acetal (412) by treatment with phenyllithium and acetonitrile. Reaction of 412 with ethylene glycol and p-toluenesulfonic acid followed by reduction with sodium-isoamyl alcohol gave the cw-piperidine (413). Hydrolysis of 413 with 5% HCl gave the tricyclic acetal (414) which was transformed to a separable 1 1 mixture of the ketones (415 and 416) by treatment with pyrrolidine-acetic acid. Reaction of ketone 416 with methyllithium followed by dehydration with thionyl chloride afforded the rather unstable olefin (417) which on catalytic hydrogenation over platinum oxide in methanol gave precoccinelline (100). Oxidation of 100 with m-chloroperbenzoic acid yielded coccinelline (99) (Scheme 52) (336,450). 

Dihydromuscimol (49) is a conformationally restricted analogue of the physiologically important neurotransmitter y-aminobutyric acid (GABA) and has been prepared using the cycloaddition of dibromoformaldoxime to A-Boc-allylamine followed by N-deprotection with sodium hydroxide (Scheme 6.52) (278). The individual enantiomers of dihydromuscimol were obtained by reaction of the bromonitrile oxide with (5)-( + )-l,2-0-isopropylidene-3-butene-l,2-diol, followed by separation of the diastereoisomeric mixture (erythro/threo 76 24), hydrolysis of respective isomers, and transformation of the glycol moiety into an amino group (279). 

The first microwave-assisted Wolff-Kishner reduction was described by Parquet and Lin in 199763. The transformation of isatin to oxindole was performed on a small scale in a domestic microwave oven in two steps with a total reaction time of 40 s, as compared to 3—4 h if classical heating was utilised (Scheme 4.36). The first step involved the transformation of the carbonyl group into the hydrazone with 55% hydrazine in ethylene glycol and medium power microwave irradiation for 30 s. In the subsequent reduction step, KOH in ethylene glycol was used to substitute the more hazardous sodium ethoxide. The reaction mixture was irradiated for 10 s and the product was obtained in a yield of 32%. 

The base-mediated conversion of arylsulfonylhydrazones to alkenes was first observed by Bamford and Stevens in 1952.6 In a representative transformation, tosylhydrazone 3 was converted to cyclohexene (4) in quantitative yield after refluxing for 90 minutes in an alkoxide solution derived from dissolution of sodium in ethylene glycol. These reactions are believed to proceed via intermediate diazo compounds, which are transformed to alkenes by thermal elimination processes. 

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