Synlett 2017; 28(08): 989-993
DOI: 10.1055/s-0036-1588942
letter
© Georg Thieme Verlag Stuttgart · New York

Enantioselective Conjugate Addition of Azlactones to Nitroolefins with a Thiourea-Based Bifunctional Organocatalyst

Xiaoyu Han*
Key Laboratory for Chemical and Biological Processing Technology of Farm Products of Zhejiang Province, School of Biological and Chemical Engineering, Zhejiang University of Science and Technology, No. 318 Liuhe Road, Hangzhou 310023, P. R. of China   Email: chemhanxy@zust.edu.cn   Email: yjwang@zust.edu.cn
,
Fenfen Chen
Key Laboratory for Chemical and Biological Processing Technology of Farm Products of Zhejiang Province, School of Biological and Chemical Engineering, Zhejiang University of Science and Technology, No. 318 Liuhe Road, Hangzhou 310023, P. R. of China   Email: chemhanxy@zust.edu.cn   Email: yjwang@zust.edu.cn
,
Can Ye
Key Laboratory for Chemical and Biological Processing Technology of Farm Products of Zhejiang Province, School of Biological and Chemical Engineering, Zhejiang University of Science and Technology, No. 318 Liuhe Road, Hangzhou 310023, P. R. of China   Email: chemhanxy@zust.edu.cn   Email: yjwang@zust.edu.cn
,
Yongjiang Wang*
Key Laboratory for Chemical and Biological Processing Technology of Farm Products of Zhejiang Province, School of Biological and Chemical Engineering, Zhejiang University of Science and Technology, No. 318 Liuhe Road, Hangzhou 310023, P. R. of China   Email: chemhanxy@zust.edu.cn   Email: yjwang@zust.edu.cn
› Author Affiliations
Further Information

Publication History

Received: 25 October 2016

Accepted after revision: 31 December 2016

Publication Date:
02 February 2017 (online)


‡ These authors contributed equally to this work.

Abstract

A bifunctional, thiourea-based, cinchona alkaloid derived catalyst showed a high catalytic activity in an enantioselective conjugate addition of azlactones to nitroolefins to give a series of diastereopure N,O-aminals in high yields and with high enantioselectivities. The method provides a potential tool for the stereoselective construction of β-amino acid derivatives.

Supporting Information

 
  • References and Notes

  • 1 Kanai M, Kato N, Ichikawa E, Shibasaki M. Synlett 2005; 1491
    • 2a Ma J.-A, Cahard D. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2004; 43: 4566
    • 2b Monari M, Montroni E, Nitti A, Lombardo M, Trombini C, Quintavalla A. Chem. Eur. J. 2015; 21: 11038
    • 2c Aitken LS, Arezki NR, Dell’Isola A, Cobb AJ. A. Synthesis 2013; 45: 2627
    • 2d Wende RC, Schreiner PR. Green Chem. 2012; 14: 1821
  • 3 Okino T, Hoashi Y, Takemoto Y. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2003; 125: 12672
  • 4 Okino T, Nakamura S, Furukawa T, Takemoto Y. Org. Lett. 2004; 6: 625
  • 5 Berkessel A, Mukherjee S, Müller TN, Cleeman F, Roland K, Brandenburg M, Neudörfl J.-M, Lex J. Org. Biomol. Chem. 2006; 4: 4319
  • 6 Quigley C, Rodríguez-Docampo Z, Connon SJ. Chem. Commun. 2012; 48: 1443
    • 7a Jiao L, Zhao X, Liu H, Ye X, Li Y, Jiang Z. Org. Chem. Front. 2016; 3: 470
    • 7b Ashokkumar V, Siva A. Org. Biomol. Chem. 2015; 13: 10216
    • 7c Zhang K, Li F, Nie J, Ma J. Sci. China: Chem. 2014; 57: 265
    • 7d Wang Q, Gong J, Liu Y, Wang Y, Zhou Z. Tetrahedron 2014; 70: 8168
    • 7e Bächle F, Duschmalé J, Ebner C, Pfaltz A, Wennemers H. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2013; 52: 12619
    • 7f de la Torre AF, Rivera DG, Ferreira MA. B, Corrêa AG, Paixão MW. J. Org. Chem. 2013; 78: 10221
    • 7g Dou X, Yao W, Zhou B, Lu Y. Chem. Commun. 2013; 49: 9224
    • 7h Clerici P, Wennemers H. Org. Biomol. Chem. 2012; 10: 110
    • 7i Kano T, Yamamoto A, Song S, Maruoka K. Chem. Commun. 2011; 47: 4358
    • 7j Berner OM, Tedeschi L, Enders D. Eur. J. Org. Chem. 2002; 1877
    • 8a Wang C.-M, Xiao J.-A, Wang J, Wang S.-S, Deng Z.-X, Yang H. J. Org. Chem. 2016; 81: 8001
    • 8b de Castro PP, Carpanez G, Amarante GW. Chem. Eur. J. 2016; 22: 10294
    • 8c Liu X, Wang Y, Yang D, Zhang J, Liu D, Su W. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2016; 55: 8100
    • 8d Yu X.-Y, Chen J.-R, Wei Q, Cheng H.-G, Liu Z.-C, Xiao W.-J. Chem. Eur. J. 2016; 22: 6774
    • 8e Zhang Y.-C, Zhu Q.-N, Yang X, Zhou L.-J, Shi F. J. Org. Chem. 2016; 81: 1681
    • 8f Alba A.-NR, Rios R. Chem. Asian J. 2011; 6: 720
    • 8g Varga E, Mika LT, Csámpai A, Holczbauer T, Kardos G, Soós T. RSC Adv. 2015; 5: 95079
    • 8h Hou X, Ma Z, Wang J, Liu H. Youji Huaxue 2014; 34: 1509
    • 8i Balaguer A.-N, Companyó X, Calvet T, Font-Bardía M, Moyano A, Rios R. Eur. J. Org. Chem. 2009; 199
  • 9 Uraguchi D, Ueki Y, Ooi T. Science 2009; 326: 120
  • 10 Uraguchi D, Ueki Y, Ooi T. Chem. Sci. 2012; 3: 842
  • 11 Metrano AJ, Miller SJ. J. Org. Chem. 2014; 79: 1542
  • 12 Berkessel A, Cleemann F, Mukherjee S, Müller TN, Lex J. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2005; 44: 807
  • 13 Lee JW, Ryu TH, Oh JS, Bae HY, Jang HB, Song CE. Chem. Commun. 2009; 7224
  • 14 N,O-Aminals 3; General Procedure An oven-dried 5 mL vial was charged with nitroolefin 2 (0.1 mmol, 1.0 equiv), quinine-derived thiourea bifunctional catalyst 9 (0.01 mmol, 0.1 equiv), and toluene (0.5 mL), and the resulting solution was cooled to –40 °C. Azlactone 1 (0.11 mmol, 1.1 equiv) was then introduced. At the end of the reaction, the solvent was removed in vacuo and the residue was purified by column chromatography [silica gel, hexane–EtOAc (15:1 to 10:1)] to give the conjugate addition product 3 in 56–98% yield.
  • 15 4-Isopropyl-2-[(1R)-2-nitro-1-phenylethyl]-1,3-oxazol-5(2H)-one (3a) Pale yellow solid; yield: 26.2 mg (95%; 80% ee); [α]D 26 +48.5 (c 0.9, CHCl3); HPLC: Chiralcel ID-H (10% i-PrOH–hexanes; flow rate: 1.0 mL/min; λ = 254 nm); tR (major): 9.72 min; tR (minor): 8.65 min. 1H NMR (400 MHz, CDCl3): δ = 7.32–7.29 (m, 3 H), 7.13 (t, J = 4.0 Hz, 2 H), 6.20 (d, J = 4.0 Hz, 1 H), 5.02 (dd, J1 = 8.0, J2 = 8.0 Hz, 1 H), 4.84 (dd, J1 = 12.0, J2 = 8.0 Hz, 1 H), 4.23 (dt, J1 = 12.0, J2 = 4.0 Hz, 1 H), 2.76–2.69 (m, 1 H), 1.09 (d, J = 8.0 Hz, 3 H), 0.84 (d, J = 4.0 Hz, 3 H). 13C NMR (100 MHz, CDCl3): δ = 169.5, 164.3, 131.2, 129.1, 128.8, 97.4, 75.4, 46.9, 27.9, 18.6, 18.5. HRMS (ESI): m/z [M + H]+ calcd for C14H17N2O4: 277.1183; found: 277.1179.
  • 16 (2R)-3-Nitro-2-phenylpropan-1-ol (14) A solution of oxazolone 3a (27.6 mg, 0.10 mmol) in i-PrOH (5.0 mL) was treated with a solution of KHSO4 (68.0 mg, 0.50 mmol) in H2O (2.5 mL) at 10 °C until the reaction was complete (TLC). The mixture was then diluted with H2O and the mixture was extracted with Et2O. The organic layers were combined, washed with sat. aq NaHCO3, dried (Na2SO4), filtered, and concentrated under reduced pressure. The residue obtained was used in the next step without further purification. The crude aldehyde was then dissolved in MeOH (5.0 mL), and the solution was cooled to 0 °C. NaBH4 (5.68 mg, 0.15 mmol) was added, and the mixture was stirred for 30 min. The resulting solution was diluted with brine, and the aqueous phase was extracted with Et2O (2 ×). The combined organic extractsw were dried (Na2SO4), filtered, and concentrated. The residue was purified by column chromatography (silica gel, hexane/EtOAc = 4:1) to give a colorless oil; yield: 13 mg (72%, 2 steps); [α]D 26 +33.58 (c 0.7, CHCl3) [lit.18 +37.9 (c 0.530, CHCl3)]. 1H NMR (400 MHz, CDCl3): δ = 7.31–7.38 (m, 3 H), 7.20–7.26 (m, 2 H), 4.86 (dd, J = 12.4, 6.4 Hz, 1 H), 4.71 (dd, J = 12.4, 7.0 Hz, 1 H), 3.82–3.92 (m, 2 H), 3.73 (m, 1 H), 1.75 (t, J = 5.6 Hz, 1 H). 13C NMR (100 MHz, CDCl3): δ = 136.5, 129.7, 128.5, 127.2, 77.8, 64.6, 46.1. HRMS (ESI, KOAc): m/z [M + K]+ calcd for C9H11KNO3: 220.03705; found: 220.03709.
  • 17 Barco A, Benetti S, De Risi C, Pollini GP, Spalluto G, Zanirato V. Tetrahedron 1996; 52: 4719
  • 18 Czekelius C, Carreira EM. Org. Lett. 2004; 6: 4575
  • 19 Alemán J, Milelli A, Cabrera S, Reyes E, Jørgensen KA. Chem. Eur. J. 2008; 14: 10958
  • 20 Weber DC. M, Frey W, Peters R. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2013; 52: 13223
  • 21 da Silva RC, da Silva GP, Sangi DP, Pontes JG. de M, Ferreica AG, Corrêa AG, Paixão MW. Tetrahedron 2013; 69: 9007