Trifluoromethyl ketones, Henry reaction

Fluoromethyl ketones are one of the most widely used classes of peptidyl a-fluoroalkyl ketones, second only to trifluoromethyl ketones. Peptidyl fluoromethyl ketones are very effective as irreversible inhibitors of cysteine proteases the first reported use of a fluoromethyl ketone compound was the use of Z-Phe-Ala-CH2F as an irreversible inhibitor of cathepsin BJ2,31 Today, many lysine and arginine derivatives have been synthesized as potential inhibitors for trypsin and trypsin-like enzymesJ3 There are four basic methods for the synthesis of peptide fluoromethyl ketones (1) the reaction of HF with peptide diazomethyl ketones (Section 15.1.4.1.1), (2) a halogen-exchange reaction with a chloro-, bromo-, or iodomethyl ketone (Section 15.1.4.1.2), (3) a Henry nitro-aldol condensation reaction (Section 15.1.4.1.3), and (4) a modified Dakin-West acylation reaction (Section 15.1.4.1.4). 

The Henry nitro-aldol condensation involves the use of P-amino alcohols as the building blocks of fluoromethyl ketones. Although this method has been used extensively in the synthesis of monofluoropeptides (Table 2),19-121 it is more widely utilized as a method for synthesizing trifluoromethyl ketones and the details of the reaction will be discussed in Section 15.1.4.3.2. 

As with the Henry nitro-aldol condensation, the modified Dakin-West acylation is primarily used for synthesis of trifluoromethyl ketones, although there are several examples of its use in the synthesis of fluoromethyl ketones (Table 3).[31314 The modified Dakin-West reaction utilizes fluoroacetic anhydride (or other appropriate anhydrides) to form an anhydride, which then undergoes cyclization, activation of the a-carbon, and acylation at the a-carbon the precise details of this method will be discussed in Section 15.1.4.3.1. 

Similar to the Dakin-West procedure previously mentioned, the Henry nitro-aldol condensation reaction is most widely used to synthesize trifluoromethyl ketones, although there are many examples of a,a-difluoroalkyl ketones synthesized by this method (Table 6)JU 12271 The method for a,a-difluoroalkyl and trifluoromethyl ketone synthesis is identical except for the final oxidation although fluoroalkyl and a,a-difluoroalkyl ketones are easily oxidized by the Sarett method (Cr03/pyridine),[12 the corresponding trifluoromethyl ketones can only be oxidized under basic conditions (0.3 M NaOH) with KMn04Jul Also, in some of the syntheses of a,a-difluoroalkyl ketones, the nitro alcohol intermediate was protected by si-lylation with /ert-butylchlorodimethylsilane. The silyl group was later removed by TosOH prior to oxidation. The full details of this method are given in Section 15.1.4.3.2. 

In this section the synthesis of fluoroalkyl (Section 15.1.4.1.3), a,a-difluoroalkyl (Section 15.1.4.2.3), and trifluoromethyl- and perfluoroalkyl ketones are discussed collectively. The second most widely used method for synthesizing peptide fluoromethyl ketones is the Henry nitro-aldol condensation reaction, which involves the use of (3-nitro alcohols to build the fluoromethyl ketones. As with the modified Dakin-West procedure, the Henry reaction has also been used to synthesize mono-, di-, tri-, and extended fluoromethyl ketones, making it another extremely versatile synthetic method.19 12 19 27 29 33 341 However, similar to the Dakin-West procedure, the products of the Henry reaction are not chiral, since an achiral carbanion is involved in the crucial carbon bond forming step. 

Unlike the Dakin-West and Henry nitro-aldol methods previously mentioned, the reaction of aldehydes with organometallics has only been used for the synthesis of peptidyl trifluoromethyl ketones. This method, along with the Henry nitro-aldol synthesis, eliminates the use of the toxic reagents required for the Dakin-West synthesis and starts with readily... 

Quite recently, Bandini, Umani-Ronchi and coworkers also reported the highly enantioselective Henry reaction of the various trifluoromethyl ketones 54 with nitromethane catalyzed by the C6 -hydroxy quinine derivatives S3 (5 mol%) [24]. Various aliphatic and aromatic ketones were smoothly converted to the desired tertiary carbinols SS in high yields and ee values (up to 99%) without any significant electronic or steric demands (Scheme 8.17). The difluoroketones 56 proved just as useful as substrates (Scheme 8.18). Of note, the parent alkaloid, quinine, as a catalyst did not give rise to any asymmetric induction. 

Enantioselective nitroaldol reaction (Henry reaction) of simple trifluoromethyl ketone was reported by Tur and Saa [27] (Table 8.7). Reaction of trifluoromethyl ketones with nitromethane in the presence of lanthanum (III) triflate salt complex and Proton Sponge (1) (0.25 equiv. each) gave tertiary nitroaldols in 50-93% yields with... 

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