Angewandte
Chemie
DOI: 10.1002/anie.201402788
Asymmetric Catalysis
Highly Diastereo- and Enantioselective Silver-Catalyzed Double [3+2]
Cyclization of a-Imino Esters with Isocyanoacetate**
Pan-Lin Shao, Jia-Yu Liao, Yee Ann Ho, and Yu Zhao*
Dedicated to Professor Amir H. Hoveyda on the occasion of his 55th birthday
Abstract: Presented herein is a new complexity-generating
method in which both functionalities of a-imino esters undergo
stereoselective cyclization with isocyanoacetates to produce
directly linked oxazole-imidazolines, which can be trans-
formed into highly functionalized a,b-diamino esters and
imidazolinium salts in high diastereo- and enantiopurity.
Scheme 1. Double cyclization with both the imine and ester function-
alities in a-imino esters.
The generation of complexity and diversity in molecular
structures in an efficient and economical fashion is an
important goal in organic synthesis and chemical biology,[1]
for which multicomponent reactions (MCRs)[2] and cascade
reactions[3] have proven to be the most useful strategies.
Along these lines, isocyanoacetates (as functionalized iso-
cyanides)[4] have found wide application not only in classical
Passerini- and Ugi-type MCRs, but they have also proven to
be a versatile functionality to react with carbonyls,[5] imines,[6]
a,b-unsaturated carbonyls,[7] activated alkenes/alkynes,[8] etc.
to produce a wide range of heterocyclic compounds. The
combination of these reactions with further functionalization
of the products in a tandem fashion has also been extensively
studied, in particular by the group of Zhu, to produce more
complex structures.[9] We present here a conceptually differ-
ent complexity-generating method, that is, both functional-
ities in a-imino esters (previously recognized as activated
imines only) undergo cyclization with isocyanoacetate to yield
directly linked oxazole-imidazolines catalyzed by a silver salt
(Scheme 1).[10] An asymmetric variant has also been devel-
oped with the Dixon-type catalyst[5e] to produce these
compounds in high diastereo- and enantiopurity, and these
products can be further transformed into other valuable and
highly functionalized entities.
Scheme 2. Oxazole formation from aryl esters. Yields are those of the
isolated products. DMF=N,N’-dimethylformamide, Ts=4-toluenesul-
fonyl. THF=tetrahydrofuran.
known to fail to react even under harsh reaction conditions
because of the low reactivity of the enolate, derived from the
isocyanoacetate, towards an ester.[11] We argued that the use
of aryl esters could be beneficial, as the better leaving group,
aryloxide (compared with simple alkoxide from alkyl esters),
should facilitate the addition of the enolate to the ester. This
indeed led to efficient oxazole formation from different aryl
esters (1) and isocyanoacetates (2; or toluenesulfonylmethyl
isocyanide) by the use of a stoichiometric amount of a strong
base (71–99% yield for 3a–c with the use of NaH). For the
oxalate 4, interestingly, the formation of the bis(oxazole) 5 in
excellent yield was realized by using a much milder silver-
catalyzed procedure, which failed to yield 3a–c at all. Clearly
there is a synergetic effect between the ester functionalities in
4, and thus led us to consider substrates bearing different
functionalities which could mutually activate each other for
the reaction with isocyanoacetate to produce complex
molecules.
Our attention was drawn to this possibility of a double
cyclization during our initial attempts of oxazole formation
from the reaction between isocyanoacetates and esters, as
they should be more functional-group tolerant and easier to
handle than using of strong acylating reagents such as acid
chlorides (Scheme 2).[4a] Such a combination, however, was
[*] Dr. P.-L. Shao, J.-Y. Liao, Y. A. Ho, Prof. Y. Zhao
Department of Chemistry, National University of Singapore
3 Science Drive 3, Singapore 117543 (Singapore)
E-mail: zhaoyu@nus.edu.sg
Homepage: zhaoyu.science.nus.edu.sg
[**] We are grateful for the generous financial support from the
Singapore National Research Foundation (NRF Fellowship) and
National University of Singapore.
Supporting information for this article is available on the WWW
Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2014, 53, 5435 –5439
ꢀ 2014 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim
5435