Thioethers chirality

A great advantage of catalyst 24b compared with other chiral Lewis acids is that it tolerates the presence of ester, amine, and thioether functionalities. Dienes substituted at the 1-position by alkyl, aryl, oxygen, nitrogen, or sulfur all participate effectively in the present asymmetric Diels-Alder reaction, giving adducts in over 90% ee. The reaction of l-acetoxy-3-methylbutadiene and acryloyloxazolidinone catalyzed by copper reagent 24b, affords the cycloadduct in 98% ee. The first total synthesis of ewt-J -tetrahydrocannabinol was achieved using the functionalized cycloadduct obtained [23, 33e] (Scheme 1.39). 

Since carbohydrates constitute an inexpensive and highly modular chiral source for preparing chiral ligands," Claver et al. have reported the use of a series of thioether-phosphite" and thioether-phosphinite furanoside ligands" in the test palladium-catalysed allylic substitution reaction. In the first type of ligand, a systematic variation of the donor group attached to the carbon atom C5 indicated that the presence of a bulky phosphite functionality had a positive effect on the enantioselectivity. Indeed, the enantioselectivity was controlled mainly by the phosphite moiety. This was confirmed by the use of a ligand... 

In contrast to the large number of chiral pyridine derivatives used as ligands of metal complexes in asymmetric catalysis, only a few examples of chiral sulfur-containing pyridine ligands have so far been reported, such as pyridine thioethers derived from ( + )-camphor depicted in Scheme 1.33, which were assessed in the test reaction providing enantioselectivities of up to 76% ee. The related 2,2 -bipyridine thioethers were also prepared but showed a lower stereodilferentiating capability in the test reaction. 

Simpler chiral pyrrolidine thioethers, reported in 2004 by Skarzewski et al., proved to be effective ligands in the test reaction. The sense of the stereoinduction was in agreement with the nucleophilic attack directed at the allylic carbon located trans to the sulfur atom in the intermediate complex (Scheme 1.40). 

On the other hand, the enantioselective 1,4-addition of carbanions such as enolates to linear enones is an interesting challenge, since relatively few efficient methods exist for these transformations. The Michael reaction of p-dicarbonyl compounds with a,p-unsaturated ketones can be catalysed by a number of transition-metal compounds. The asymmetric version of this reaction has been performed using chiral diol, diamine, and diphosphine ligands. In the past few years, bidentate and polydentate thioethers have begun to be considered as chiral ligands for this reaction. As an example, Christoffers et al. have developed the synthesis of several S/O-bidentate and S/O/S-tridentate thioether... 

In 2004, a series of other chiral thioether-phosphine ligands based on a cyclopropane backbone were evaluated in the rhodium-catalysed hydrogenation of a dehydroamino acid by Molander el al As shown in Scheme 8.2, even if these ligands were generally active, only moderate enantioselectivities of up to 47% ee were obtained. 

In addition, Peruzzini et al. developed, in 2007, iridium complexes of planar-chiral ferrocenyl phosphine-thioether ligands that were tested in the hydrogenation of simple alkyl aryl ketones.These complexes were diastereoselec-tively generated in high yields (85-90%) by addition of the corresponding... 

In 2000, Claver et al. reported the synthesis of novel chiral S/P ligands with a xylofuranose backbone. These thioether-phosphite ligands derived from carbohydrates were investigated for the rhodium-catalysed hydroformylation of styrene but, in spite of good conversions (>99%) combined with excellent... 

Another approach in the use of chiral S/P ligands for the hydrosilylation reaction of ketones was proposed more recently by Evans et Thus, in 2003, these workers studied the application of new chiral thioether-phosphinite ligands to enantioselective rhodium-catalysed ketone hydrosilylation processes. For a wide variety of ketones, such as acyclic aryl alkyl and dialkyl ketones as well as cyclic aryl alkyl ketones and also cyclic keto esters, the reaction gave high levels of enantioselectivity of up to 99% ee (Scheme 10.44). 

In 1994, the scope of this p-hydroxy sulfoximine ligand was extended to the borane reduction of ketimine derivatives by these workers. The corresponding chiral amines were formed with enantioselectivities of up to 72% ee, as shown in Scheme 10.57. It was found that the A -substituent of the ketimine had a major influence on the asymmetric induction, with a ketoxime thioether (SPh) being the most successful substrate. 

Chiral thioether-phosphite ligands (125) derived from 1,2-O-isopropylidenexylofuranose have been synthesized. Reaction of these chiral ligands with [Rh(cod)2]BF4 yielded [Rh(cod)(125)]BF4. These ligands were tested in the Rh-catalyzed hydroformylation of styrene. The hydroformylation results (ee values were insignificant) are discussed according to the solution structure of the species formed under hydroformylation conditions. HP NMR studies show that only the phosphite is coordinated during the catalytic reaction.390... 

Chiral thioether ligands coordination chemistry and asymmetric catalysis16... 

The enantioselective conjugate addition of dialkylzinc to nitroalkenes using other phosphoramidite,79,79a 83a sulfonamide,84 and binaphthol-based thioether ligands65 has also been studied in the past few years. Particularly noteworthy are the efficient chiral monodentate phosphoramidite ligands (S,R,R)-29 and (A,A)-55 developed by Feringa et al. and Alexakis et al., respectively, for this reaction. (S,R,R)-29 provided excellent enantioselectivities (up to 98% ee) for acyclic nitroalkenes (Scheme 25).80 It also worked well for other nitroolefin substrates such as 3-nitrocoumarin 7068 and methyl 3-nitropropenoate 7185. 

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