Oxazaborolidine-catalysed reduction of alk-2-ene-1,4-diones. A convenient access to chiral 1,4-diols

Article abstract of DOI:10.1016/S0040-4020(98)00936-3

An efficient method for the preparation of C₂-symmetric, chiral alk-2- ene-1,4-diols (4) has been achieved, based on the borane-mediated reduction of symmetric alk-2-ene-1,4-diones (2) in the presence of oxazaborolidine (R)- 1. In general, the presence of the double bond in 2 has been beneficial (compared with the related saturated 1,4-diketones 3) not only as far as the stereoselectivity in the reduction step is concerned, but also because it allowed us to remove meso-4 by chomatography and/or to improve the stereochemical purity of several resulting mixtures of diols 4 by Sharpless' epoxidation. Enantioenricbed compounds 4 have been readily reduced to saturated diols with negligible loss of optical purity.