Total Synthesis of (+/-)-Wikstromol

Article abstract of DOI:10.1021/jo00255a012

The antineoplastic prototype lignan natural product wikstromol was synthesized in racemic form by a straightforward sequence involving, as its key transformations,oxidative coupling of a carboxylic acid dianion,generation and stereoselective oxidation of a potassium enolate,and a deprotection step.The overall yield for nine steps is 29percent.Depending on the choice of oxidants for the enolate,considerable modification in the ratio of stereoisomeric products is possible.