Self-supported and clean one-step cathodic coupling of activated olefins with benzyl bromide derivatives in a micro flow reactor

Article abstract of DOI:10.1002/anie.200600951

(Chemical Equation Presented) Currently coupled: A clean microreactor-based electrosyntheses in the absence of supporting electrolyte is demonstrated and shown to feature very simple cell geometries. As exemplified for the coupling reaction of various ole

Full text of DOI:10.1002/anie.200600951

Communications
Microreactors
reactor flow through conditions to generate higher yields of
products when compared with conventional synthetic meth-
ods. Considerable benefits of the novel electrochemical
process are 1) simple operation, 2) no need for chemical
reagents or electrolytes, 3) simple work-up, and 4) a surpris-
ingly high yield.
DOI: 10.1002/anie.200600951
Self-Supported and Clean One-Step Cathodic
Coupling of Activated Olefins with Benzyl
Bromide Derivatives in a Micro Flow Reactor**
Initially, the coupling of dimethyl fumarate with benzyl
bromide was selected for study by cyclic voltammetry experi-
ments. Both dimethyl fumarate and dimethyl maleate are
known to be reduced in one-electron processes, both leading
to the dimethyl fumarate radical anions as the intermediate
followed by slow hydrodimerization.[6] The reduction of
benzyl bromide is usually found to be chemically irreversible
leading to the formation of dibenzyl products. The one-
electron reduction of benzyl bromide proceeds through the
benzyl radical intermediate. The two-electron reduction of
benzyl bromide to give a benzyl carbanion may occur at
sufficiently negative potentials, at mercury pool electrodes,[7]
or in the presence of electrophilic reagents such as protons.
Figure 1A shows typical (conventional) cyclic voltammo-
grams for the reduction of benzyl bromide (curve a), dimethyl
fumarate (curve b), and dimethyl fumarate in the presence of
benzyl bromide (curve c). The reduction of dimethyl fumarate
occurs as a reversible one-electron process. In the presence of
benzyl bromide, the peak current of the reduction wave for
dimethyl fumarate remains and the re-oxidation wave after
reversal of the scan direction completely disappears. A
complete loss of the anodic peak reveals a rapid chemical
reaction of the dimethyl fumarate radical anion with benzyl
bromide. From the peak current in Figure 1A (and based on
additional microelectrode experiments, see Supporting Infor-
mation), the process can be identified as a one-electron
process. As will be shown below, on a longer time scale during
the course of electrolysis, transfer of a second electron occurs
and is attributed to a further unidentified processes.
Ping He, Paul Watts, Frank Marken, and
Stephen J. Haswell*
Electrosynthesis offers a clean and versatile method for the
generation of anion and cation radical intermediates.[1] The
addition of electrons to, or the removal of electrons from,
neutral organic substrates can be achieved under relatively
mild reaction conditions and may lead to powerful electro-
synthetic strategies. A possible role of electrosynthesis in
[2]
“green chemistry”has been highlighted by several authors,
particularly in combination with the recently emerging
microreactor technology.[3a–c] Microreactors have numerous
practical advantages including safe operating, easy modula-
tion, and easy scale-up for industrial production when
compared with batch reactors.[3d,e] The combination of
electrosynthesis with microreactors has made electrochemis-
try more accessible even in the absence of electrolyte.[4]
À
In synthetic chemistry, C C-bond-formation processes
are of considerable importance and new methods are
constantly sought with the aim of obtaining clean, simple,
À
and efficient synthetic routes. Herein, we describe a C C-
bond-formation method based on the electro-reductive
coupling of activated olefins and benzyl bromide derivatives.
The coupling products such as 2-benzyl succinic acid dimethyl
ester are important classes of compounds owing to their utility
as intermediates in the synthesis of important targets such as
natural antibiotics,[5a] pyrrolidines,[5b] metalloproteinase inhib-
itors,[5c] inhibitors towards human leukocytes,[5d] cephalo-
taxine,[5e] and monoesters of alkylated succinic acids.[5f]
Several methods have been reported[5b,g,h] for this class of
compounds, most of which involve multi-step processes and
require the presence of metal catalysts. Alternatively, a
photochemical procedure based on electron transfer to a
photo-sensitizer has been proposed for the coupling of
methylbenzene and dimethylsuccinate,[5i] but the method
resulted in a complex mixture of reaction products. In
contrast, the process described herein is based on a clean
one-step cathodic coupling process carried out under micro-
During the main electrode reaction, the interaction of the
primary fumarate radical anion and benzyl bromide is
À
believed to lead to rapid C C coupling. The coupling,
followed by loss of bromide, occurs only if a sufficient driving
1
force for this process is available. The parameter DE (E = ,df
À
2
1
E
= ,bb) describes the potential difference for the reduction of
2
the dimethyl fumarate (df) and for benzyl bromide (bb) and is
obtained here as an approximate measure of the energy
balance in the intermolecular electron transfer. If DE
À
becomes too high, the energy for the C Br bond heterolysis
will be insufficient.
Preparative microreactor electrolyses were conducted in a
flow cell (see Figure 2) to isolate and identify products by
using GC/MS as well as 1H and 13C NMR spectroscopy and to
optimize yields for the coupling of dimethyl fumarate (or
dimethyl maleate) with benzyl bromide. The solution con-
taining 5 mm dimethyl fumarate (or dimethyl maleate) and
5 mm benzyl bromide in DMF (N,N-dimethylformamide) was
continuously pumped through the cell in which two platinum
electrodes with a working area of 45 mm2 were positioned
with an inter-electrode gap of 160 mm or 320 mm. The coupling
reactions were conducted galvanostatically and product
samples were collected in a product vial for 5 min. Table 1
summarizes the conversion and product distribution for the
[*] Dr. P. He, Dr. P. Watts, Prof. S. J. Haswell
Department of Chemistry
University of Hull, Hull, HU67RX (UK)
Fax: (+44)148-246-6416
E-mail: s.j.haswell@hull.ac.uk
Dr. F. Marken
Department of Chemistry
University of Bath, Bath, BA27AY (UK)
[**] We thank the EPSRC for funding.
Supporting information for this article is available on the WWW
under http://www.angewandte.org or from the author.
4146
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Chemie
À
Figure 2. Schematic representation of the C C coupling reaction
during electrosynthesis in a microreactor. A flow of reagents through a
rectangular duct with the working and counter electrodes facing each
other results in the formation of products.
estingly, unwanted dimerization of olefins was found to be less
than 2% plus a very small amount of toluene (from
debromination of benzyl bromide) and no dimerization of
benzyl bromide was detected. The best result obtained was
98% of 2-benzyl dimethylsuccinate with only 2% of the
homo-dimer tetramethyl butanetetracarboxylate and toluene
at a flow rate of 10 or 15 mLminÀ1 (Table 1, entries 5 and 6,
respectively). At higher flow rates, the possibility of homo-
dimerization of the olefin was observed (Table 1, entry 7).
This electrochemical procedure was also scaled up in a
“parallel”microreactor cell containing two equally sized sets
of electrodes. Again, dimethyl fumarate was completely
converted to give the cross-coupling product 2-benzyldime-
thylsuccinate with only 2% of olefin dimer and toluene. In
this case, a volumetric flow rate equivalent to 30 mLminÀ1 (i.e.
15 mLminÀ1 ” 2 flow cells) was achieved, which is double the
flow rate of the single cell and hence producing twice the
quantity of the product in a given time. Other benzyl bromide
derivatives such as 4-methoxybenzyl bromide, 4-methylben-
zyl bromide, 4-bromobenzyl bromide, 4-iodobenzyl bromide,
and 1-phenylethyl bromide were also examined for coupling
reactions with dimethyl fumarate using the same microreactor
Figure 1. A) Cyclic voltammograms (scan rate 10 VsÀ1) obtained at a
platinum disc electrode (diameter 0.5 mm) immersed in 0.1m
nBu4NBF4/DMF for: a) 3 mm benzylbromide, b) 3 m m dimethyl
fumarate, and c) 3 mm dimethylfumarate in the presence of 3 m m
benzylbromide. The parameter DE when compared to the energy for
À
heterolytic C Br bond fission allows the driving force for the reaction
to be assessed (see text). B) Plot of the yield of the R1–R2 coupling
product (see Table 1) versus the gap in halfwave potential for:
1) dimethylfumarate/benzylbromide, 2) dimethyl
Table 1: Data for the preparative electrolysis of activated olefins in the presence of benzyl bromides in a
fumarate/4-bromobenzylbromide, 3) dimethyl
fumarate/1-phenylethylbenzyl bromide, 4) fumaro-
nitrile/benzyl bromide, 5) dimethyl fumarate/4-
methoxybenzylbromide, 6) fumaronitriel /4-bro-
mobenzylbromide, 7) mael ic anhydride/bisbro-
momethylbenzene, 8) maleic anhydride/benzyl
bromide.
micro flow cell without intentionally added supporting electrolyte.[a]
No. I [mA] Olefin
R2-Br
R2
Flow
Conv. [%][b]
Distribution [%]
R1-R2 others[c]
R1
[mLminÀ1
]
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
0.6
1.5
0.6
0.6
0.6
0.6
0.6
0.6
0.6
0.6
0.6
0.6
0.5
0.5
0.5
0.3
dimethylmael ate
dimethylmael ate
dimethylmael ate
dimethylmael ate
dimethylfumarate benzyl
dimethylfumarate benzyl
dimethylfumarate benzyl
benzyl
benzyl
benzyl
benzyl
20
47
89 11
20
10
15
10
15
20
77
100
100
100
100
100
100
100
100
100
100
70
98
98
30
2
2
2
2
6
6
6
1
1
98
range of conditions employed in this study.
Both conversion and product distribution
are strongly dependent on the electrode
gap, the flow rate, and the applied current.
For a 320-mm inter-electrode gap (Table 1,
entries 1 and 2), 47% and 77% conversion
to the desired coupling product can be
achieved with significant homo-coupling
side products. An increase in current was
found to enhance only homo-dimerization
of the olefin or benzyl bromide. For an
inter-electrode gap of 160 mm (Table 1,
entries 3–7), relatively lower voltages (4–
4.4 V) were required to obtain sufficiently
high levels of conversion (> 95%). Inter-
98
94
94
94
99
99
98
96
93
95
84
dimethylfumarate 4-methoxybenzyl 10
dimethylfumarate 4-methybl enzyl
dimethylfumarate 4-bromobenzyl
dimethylfumarate 4-iodobenzyl
dimethylfumarate 1-phenyel thyl
fumaronitrile
fumaronitrile
fumaronitrile
maleic anhydride
10
10
10
10
10
10
10
10
2
benzyl
100
4
7
5
4-methylbenzyl
4-bromobenzyl
dibromide
100
100
82
16[d]
[a] Olefin 5 mm, halide 5 mm, solvent DMF; the electrode gap is 320 mm for entries 1 and 2, and 160 mm
for entries 3–16. [b] Conversion was determined based on the quantity of olefin before and after reaction
using n-decane as an internal standard. [c] Other products result from dimerization of olefin and
debromination of benzylbromides; no dimerization of benzylbromides is detected except for entry 2.
[d] Other side products are 1,2-dimethylbenzene and 2-methylbenzyl bromide.
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Communications
as that used in entry 3 in Table 1. All preparative electrolyses
ical approach,[12b] and a direct Diels–Alder reaction[12c,d] for
coupling of maleic anhydride with dibromides. Interestingly,
in a flow microreactor cell excellent yields (> 93%) for
coupling of fumaronitrile and bromides (Table 1, entries 13–
15) and 84% yields for coupling of maleic anhydride and
1,2-bis(bromomethyl)benzene (Table 1, entry 16) can be
obtained.
gave excellent yields (94%) of cross-coupling products with
very small amount of olefin dimer and debrominated
products (Table 1, entries 8–12). The formation of bromine
due to oxidation of bromide was not observed presumably
owing to the limited overlap of diffusion layers within the flow
cell. Current efficiencies for all processes are typically 40–
50%. These data suggest that overall two moles of electrons
are consumed for each mole of product formed by electrol-
ysis. Cyclic voltammetry data (short time scale) do not show
evidence for the transfer of the second electron. However, the
time scale for the electrolysis process is different and the
second electron transfer may occur in the later stages of the
process, for example, involving solvent.
From the results obtained, it can be seen that the presence
of benzyl bromide suppresses olefin hydrodimerization,
indicating that the reaction between olefin radical anion
and benzyl bromide is fast. The neutral benzyl radical
intermediate,[4d] which is short-lived[8] and known to either
dimerize (to give bibenzyl) or to abstract a hydrogen atom to
produce toluene,[9] appears to be an unlikely free intermedi-
ate. The absence of bibenzyl and only a small amount of
toluene indicate fast direct coupling of the dimethyl fumarate
radical anion with benzyl bromide. Scheme 1 describes a
For the proposed mechanism, the differences between the
approximate reduction halfwave potentials for the olefin and
benzyl bromide, DE, may be understood as part of a
thermodynamic cycle.[13] It is observed that conversion is
dependent on the reduction potential difference DE. For the
coupling reaction of dimethyl fumarate and benzyl bromide
with DE of 0.7 V up to 100% conversion can be achieved, and
for the coupling reaction of dimethyl fumarate and 4-
methoxybenzyl bromide with DE of 1.1 V 91% conversion
are obtained at a flow rate of 15 mLminÀ1 under the same
conditions. It is also observed that coupling reactions of
benzyl chloride with dimethyl fumarate, and that of maleic
anhydride with all benzyl bromide derivatives (DE > 1.2 V)
except 1,2-bis(bromomethyl)benzene (DE = 1.1 V) fail to
produce any cross-coupling products. The benzyl bromides
are recovered unreacted. A schematic plot of maximum yield
versus DE (Figure 1B) suggests a threshold of DE ꢀ 1.1 V for
successful coupling. This value is in approximate agreement
(DE is slightly high due to uncertainty in half wave potential
for the benzyl bromide reduction) with the value expected for
À
dissociation of the C Br bond: DE = 0.85 V (the gas phase
bond energy for benzyl bromide is Do = 82 kJmolÀ1).[14]
We have demonstrated that clean microreactor-based
electrosyntheses in the absence of supporting electrolyte are
feasible even with very simple cell geometries. The height of
the microfluidic cell and the flow rate have been shown to be
crucial for the minimization of unwanted side products and
optimization of yields. More work will be required for a better
understanding of the spatial distribution of reagents, the
electron transfer process in microreactor systems, as well as
for the optimization and scale up of processes in the
microreactor cell. For an energy-efficient use of microreactor
electrosynthesis, the resistive losses during electrosynthesis
will need further investigation and better electrode designs
may help in optimizing the efficiency of the process. It is very
likely that clean one-step electrosynthetic coupling processes
in microfluidic reactors are applicable for a wider range of
reactions.
À
Scheme 1. Plausible mechanistic reaction pathway for the C C
coupling process.
plausible reaction pathway. The mild conditions employed
during electrolysis are consistent with a one-electron pathway,
and a related transition metal complex mediated reduction of
benzyl bromide also has been shown to proceed through a
one-electron pathway.[10] However, in this particular study it is
not clear whether the final step proceeds through a second-
electron transfer process or not and this will require further
study.
Further coupling reactions between fumaronitrile and
benzyl bromides as well as between maleic anhydride and 1,2-
bis(bromomethyl)benzene were investigated. Formally equiv-
alent (but more laborious and less effective) conventional
synthetic reactions have been described in the literature, for
example, a photochemical process in the presence of organ-
ometallic catalysts for the coupling of benzyl bromide with
fumaronitrile,[11] a sacrificial zinc approach,[12a] a photochem-
Experimental Section
Cyclic voltammetric (CV) experiments were carried out with an
Autolab PGSTAT30 system in a conventional three-electrode cell and
in the presence of supporting electrolyte. A Pt disc (diameter
0.5 mm), a Pt wire, and a silver wire (both diameter 0.1 mm) were
used as the working electrode, the counter electrode, and the
reference electrode, respectively. For preparative microreactor elec-
trolyses, a Harvard PHD 2000 syringe pump was used to pump the
reaction solution containing olefin (5 mm) and benzyl bromide (5 mm)
in DMF without the addition of electrolyte through the microreactor
cell in which two platinum foil electrodes with a working area of
45 mm2 were positioned with an inter-electrode distance of 160 mm
and 320 mm.[4d] All reactions were conducted galvanostatically and
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Chemie
product samples were continuously collected 5 times and each run
took 5 min. Reactions were analyzed by GC (Shimadzu GC-17 A,
FID, column CPSIL8) using decane as an internal standard. The
replicate analysis shows RSD less than 5%. The products were also
identified using 1H and 13C NMR spectroscopy (Jeol GX400) in
CDCl3 as well as mass spectrometry (Varian 2000).
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Received: March 10, 2006
Published online: May 23, 2006
À
Keywords: C C coupling · electrochemical synthesis · flow cells ·
microreactors · olefins
.
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