Steric hindrance intermediates

A major difficulty with the Diels-Alder reaction is its sensitivity to sterical hindrance. Tri- and tetrasubstituted olefins or dienes with bulky substituents at the terminal carbons react only very slowly. Therefore bicyclic compounds with polar reactions are more suitable for such target molecules, e.g. steroids. There exist, however, several exceptions, e. g. a reaction of a tetrasubstituted alkene with a 1,1-disubstituted diene to produce a cyclohexene intermediate containing three contiguous quaternary carbon atoms (S. Danishefsky, 1979). This reaction was assisted by large polarity differences between the electron rich diene and the electron deficient ene component. 

Methacryhc acid and its ester derivatives are Ctfjy -unsaturated carbonyl compounds and exhibit the reactivity typical of this class of compounds, ie, Michael and Michael-type conjugate addition reactions and a variety of cycloaddition and related reactions. Although less reactive than the corresponding acrylates as the result of the electron-donating effect and the steric hindrance of the a-methyl group, methacrylates readily undergo a wide variety of reactions and are valuable intermediates in many synthetic procedures. 

Addition to cis- and /n t-2-butene theiefoie yields different optical isomers (10,11). The failure of chlorine to attack isobutylene is attributed to the high degree of steric hindrance to approach by the anion. The reaction intermediate stabilizes itself by the loss of a proton, resulting in a very rapid reaction even at ambient temperature (12). 

The mechanism of the alkoxymercuration reaction is similar to that described in Section 7.4 for hvdroxymercuration. The reaction is initiated by electrophilic addition of Iig2+ to the alkene, followed by reaction of the intermediate cation with alcohol and reduction of the C-Hg bond by NaBH4. A variety of alcohols and alkenes can be used in the alkoxymercuration reaction. Primary, secondary, and even tertiary alcohols react well, but ditertiary ethers can t be prepared because of steric hindrance to reaction. 

The selectivity decreases with increasing amide size. This may be due to steric hindrance which prevents the chiral ligand from approaching the reaction site or may reflect a change in the reaction mechanism going from an SN1 reaction (A-acylimine 2 as intermediate) to an SN2 displacement of benzotriazole11. 

This contrary stereochemistry in the Bucherer - Bergs reaction of camphor has been attributed to steric hindrance of e.w-attack of the cyanide ion on the intermediate imine. Normally, equatorial approach of the cyanide ion is preferred, giving the axial (t>Mr/o)-amino nitrile by kinetic control. This isomer is trapped under Bucherer-Bergs conditions via urea and hydan-toin formation. In the Strecker reaction, thermodynamic control of the amino nitrile formation leads to an excess of the more stable compound with an equatorial (e.w)-amino and an axial (endo)-cyano (or carboxylic) function13-17. 

Table 12-4. Inductive effect and steric hindrance in the intermediate of azo coupling of 1-naphthol-3-sulfonic acid in the 2- and 4-positions, respectively (Stamm and Zollinger, 1957).

It is apparent from equation (16) that if k x becomes much larger than k 2, the rate will depend upon k 2 and so a kinetic isotope effect will be observed. Now kL j will become large if there is steric hindrance to formation of the intermediate, and a number of examples are now known where an electrophile which normally gives no isotope effect, does so if formation of the intermediate is hindered. 

The formation of isomeric aldehydes is caused by cobalt organic intermediates, which are formed by the reaction of the olefin with the cobalt carbonyl catalyst. These cobalt organic compounds isomerize rapidly into a mixture of isomer position cobalt organic compounds. The primary cobalt organic compound, carrying a terminal fixed metal atom, is thermodynamically more stable than the isomeric internal secondary cobalt organic compounds. Due to the less steric hindrance of the terminal isomers their further reaction in the catalytic cycle is favored. Therefore in the hydroformylation of an olefin the unbranched aldehyde is the main reaction product, independent of the position of the double bond in the olefinic educt ( contrathermodynamic olefin isomerization) [49]. 

We passed then to a particular olefin, adamantylideneadamantane, whose reaction with Br2 had been shown to stop at the stage of bromonium ion formation because of steric hindrance to backside nucleophilic attack. An UV-Vis spectrophotometric study (ref. 10) has shown that the complicated equilibrium reported in Scheme 4 is immediately established on mixing the olefin and Br2 in DCE. Equilibrium (1) could be isolated by working at low Br2 and ten to hundred fold higher olefin concentrations. A Scott plot followed by a NLLSQ refinement of the data gave a Kf = 2.89 x 10 (4.0) M-l. It is worth noting that conductimetric measurements showed the non-ionic nature of the 1 1 adduct, consistent with a CTC intermediate, but not with a bromonium-bromide species. 

These observations are, indeed, consistent with an associative activation, generation of a seven-coordinated intermediate (easier in the case of Mo and W than for Cr because their larger sizes produce less steric hindrance) by attack taking place directly upon the metal atom, that is, with an A or a limiting 5 2 mechanism, accompanied by a reaction sequence involving dissociative activation similar to scheme (24) above, viz. 

The preparation of ketones and ester from (3-dicarbonyl enolates has largely been supplanted by procedures based on selective enolate formation. These procedures permit direct alkylation of ketone and ester enolates and avoid the hydrolysis and decarboxylation of keto ester intermediates. The development of conditions for stoichiometric formation of both kinetically and thermodynamically controlled enolates has permitted the extensive use of enolate alkylation reactions in multistep synthesis of complex molecules. One aspect of the alkylation reaction that is crucial in many cases is the stereoselectivity. The alkylation has a stereoelectronic preference for approach of the electrophile perpendicular to the plane of the enolate, because the tt electrons are involved in bond formation. A major factor in determining the stereoselectivity of ketone enolate alkylations is the difference in steric hindrance on the two faces of the enolate. The electrophile approaches from the less hindered of the two faces and the degree of stereoselectivity depends on the steric differentiation. Numerous examples of such effects have been observed.51 In ketone and ester enolates that are exocyclic to a conformationally biased cyclohexane ring there is a small preference for... 

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