SUBJECTS iodides 662 -methylenes

The de novo discovery synthesis of capecitabine (1) was reported by the Nippon Roche Research Center scientists9,19 and was followed up with a preparation invented by a team at the Hoffinann-La Roche laboratories in New Jersey for the conversion to 1 from 5 -DFCR (10).2° In the first route, 5-fluorocytosine (15) was mono-silated using one equivalent of hexamethyldisilazane in toluene at 100 °C followed by stannic chloride-catalyzed glycosidation with known 5-deoxy-l,2,3-tri-0-acetyl-p-D-ribofuranoside (17) in ice-cooled methylene chloride. While this procedure provided the 2, 3 -di-0-acetyl 5-fluorocytidine 18 in 76% yield on a 25-g scale, an alternative method was also devised using in situ-generated trimethylsilyl iodide in acetonitrile at 0°C to provide a 49% yield of 18 on smaller scale. Acylation of the N -amino group of the bis-protected 5 -DFCR derivative was accomplished by the slow addition of two equivalents of -pentyl chloroformate to a solution of 18 in a mixture of pyridine and methylene chloride at -20 °C, followed by a quench with methanol at room temperature to provide the penultimate intermediate 19 on 800-g scale. The yield of intermediate 19 was assumed to be quantitative and was subjected to the final deprotection step, with only a trituration to... 

A(, -Dimethyl(methylene)iminium salts have been the most widely used class of preformed iminium salts, mainly due to their applications in the synthesis of a,p-unsaturated carbonyl compounds, normally accomplished by subjecting the /V, -dimethyl Mannich base to quatemarization followed by base-induced elimination. Table 3 outlines various counterion forms of /V, -dimethyl(methylene)iminium salts that have been used in Mannich reactions as well as their synthetic precursors. The crystalline iodide (30), known also as Eschenmoser s salt , has seen the most widespread use and is prepared by thermal fragmentation of (iodomethyl)trimethylammonium iodide or, more conveniently, by a variant of the... 

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