DOI: 10.1002/chem.201102332
Direct Catalytic Asymmetric Intramolecular Conjugate Addition of
Thioamide to a,b-Unsaturated Esters
Yuta Suzuki,[a, b] Ryo Yazaki,[a, b] Naoya Kumagai,*[a] and Masakatsu Shibasaki*[a]
Catalytic asymmetric conjugate addition of carbon pronu-
cleophiles to electron-deficient olefin is one of the most reli-
phenylphospholano)ethane) exhibits high performance in
terms of catalytic efficiency and stereoselectivity. In this
context, we attempted to apply the cooperative catalyst to a
catalytic asymmetric intermolecular 1,4-type conjugate addi-
tion of thioamides to electron-deficient olefins. Despite sev-
eral trials, however, the reaction was unsuccessful,[11] pre-
sumably due to a different transition-state structure from
1,2-type addition, which would be unfavorable in the asym-
À
able and well-developed enantioselective C C bond-forming
reactions.[1] In situ generation of carbon nucleophiles offers
an efficient entry to this process, allowing for the construc-
tion of stereogenic carbon with perfect atom economy.[2]
Historically, active methylene compounds are widely used as
pronucleophiles due to their high enolization aptitude,[1] fol-
lowed by the successful application of aldehydes and ke-
tones as pronucleophiles by metal-based catalysis[3] and en-
amine catalysis.[4] Catalytic generation of active enolates
from carbonyl-type pronucleophiles in the carboxylic acid
oxidation state is a formidable task and thus their use in this
catalytic process is largely limited.[5] Our recent investiga-
tions of soft Lewis acid/hard Brønsted base cooperative cat-
alysis[6] revealed that thioamides are viable pronucleophiles,
because they are in the carboxylic acid oxidation state, al-
lowing for further manipulation of the product; specific
soft–soft interaction of thioamides and soft Lewis acids
allows for facile deprotonation with the aid of mild base to
generate thioamide enolates in a catalytic manner.[7–9] As
part of our continuing effort to pursue the utility of thioa-
mides as pronucleophiles, herein we report the direct cata-
lytic asymmetric intramolecular conjugate addition of thioa-
mide to a,b-unsaturated ester, providing enantiomerically
enriched five- and six-membered carbocycles bearing ester
and thioamide functions in an anti fashion.
metric environment provided by the [CuACHTUNGTRNEUNG(CH3CN)4]PF6/Ph-
BPE/LiOAr catalyst. To compensate for the entropic factor
for an intermolecular reaction, we turned our attention to
intramolecular conjugate addition of the thioamide function-
ality to an a,b-unsaturated ester.
An initial trial was conducted with substrate 1a; N,N-di-
benzylthiopropionamide and ethyl acrylate were tethered by
benzene, which was then exposed to 10 mol% of the [Cu-
ACHUTNGRENUN(G CH3CN)4]PF6/ACHTUTGNERNN(UGN S,S)-Ph-BPE/Li(OC6H4-p-OMe) catalyst in
THF at 08C; and the desired product anti-2a was obtained
in >99% yield and >20:1 anti selectivity, albeit with moder-
ate enantioselectivity (60% ee; Table 1, entry 1).[12] Nonpo-
lar (toluene) and aprotic polar (DMF) solvents were tested
and the reaction in DMF afforded the highest enantioselec-
tivity (entries 1–3). The reaction proceeded smoothly even
at À408C and enantioselectivity increased to 79% ee
(entry 4). The ligand (S)-Xyl-P-Phos (Xyl-P-Phos=2,2’,6,6’-
tetramethoxy-4,4’-bis(di(3,5-xylyl)phosphino)-3,3’-bipyridine)
outperformed (S,S)-Ph-BPE exhibiting higher enantioselec-
tivity with a marginal decrease in chemical yield (entry 5),
We have previously reported that [CuACTHNUTRGNEUNG
(CH3CN)4]+XÀ/
chiral bisphosphine ligand/LiOAr served as an effective soft
Lewis acid/hard Brønsted base cooperative catalyst for acti-
vating soft Lewis basic pronucleophiles.[10] For the 1,2-type
addition of in situ generated thioamide enolates, such as
aldol and Mannich-type reactions, a catalyst composed of
which was recovered by the use of [CuACHTNGUTERNNU(G CH3CN)4]SbF6 as a
cationic soft Lewis acid (entry 6). Intriguingly, the intramo-
lecular conjugate addition of 1a was catalyzed solely by
10 mol% of Li(OC6H4-p-OMe) in DMF with diastereos-
witching, affording the syn product 2a in >99% yield and
1:9.1 syn selectivity (entry 7), whereas no reaction proceed-
ed with 10 mol% of Li(OC6H4-p-OMe) in THF, even at
room temperature (entry 8). This observation suggested that
DMF significantly enhanced the Brønsted basicity of
Li(OC6H4-p-OMe) to induce enolization of the thioamide
and that the Li cation of Li thioamide enolate would be in
near proximity to the ester at the transition state to give
syn-2a preferentially. With the Cu–bisphosphine complex,
the intermediate is likely a Cu thioamide enolate with a
large bisphosphine ligand and conjugate addition in an anti-
fashion would be favorable.
[CuACHTUNGTRENNUNG(CH3CN)4]PF6/Ph-BPE/LiOAr (Ph-BPE=1,2-bis(2,5-di-
[a] Y. Suzuki, R. Yazaki, Dr. N. Kumagai, Prof. Dr. M. Shibasaki
Institute of Microbial Chemistry, Tokyo, 3-14-23 Kamiosaki
Shinagawa-ku, Tokyo 141-0021 (Japan)
Fax : (+81)3-3441-7589
[b] Y. Suzuki, R. Yazaki
Graduate School of Pharmaceutical Sciences
The University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo
Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-0033 (Japan)
With a suitable catalyst in hand, we next examined the
substrate scope of the intramolecular conjugate addition
Supporting information for this article is available on the WWW
11998
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Chem. Eur. J. 2011, 17, 11998 – 12001