Enabling Suzuki-Miyaura coupling of Lewis-basic arylboronic esters with a nonprecious metal catalyst.

The high cost and negative environmental impact of precious metal catalysts has led to increased demand for nonprecious alternatives for widely practiced reactions such as the Suzuki-Miyaura coupling (SMC). Ni-catalyzed versions of this reaction have failed to achieve high reactivity with Lewis-basic arylboron nucleophiles, especially pinacolboron esters. We describe the development of (PPhMe)NiCl as an inexpensive and air-stable precatalyst that addresses this challenge.

Scalable Asymmetric Syntheses of Foslevodopa and Foscarbidopa Drug Substances for the Treatment of Parkinson's Disease.

Foslevodopa (FLD, levodopa 4'-monophosphate, ) and foscarbidopa (FCD, carbidopa 4'-monophosphate, ) were identified as water-soluble prodrugs of levodopa (LD, ) and carbidopa (CD, ), respectively, which are useful for the treatment of Parkinson's disease. Herein, we describe asymmetric syntheses of FLD () and FCD () drug substances and their manufacture at pilot scale. The synthesis of FLD () employs a Horner-Wadsworth-Emmons olefination reaction followed by enantioselective hydrogenation of the double bond as key steps to introduce the α-amino acid moiety with the desired stereochemistry.

Synthesis of Enantioenriched β-Aryl-β-aryloxy Esters via Sequential Photoisomerization and Enantioselective Hydrogenation.

A general method to prepare valuable chiral synthon β-aryl-β-aryloxy esters from enantioselective hydrogenation of ()-β-aryl-β-aryloxy-α,β-unsaturated esters is described. The E-isomer was prepared via isomerization of the mixture of E- and Z-isomers using photocatalyst [Ir(ppy)(dtbbpy)]PF. A laser as the light source facilitated isomerization with only 0.

Discovery and Development of Metal-Catalyzed Coupling Reactions in the Synthesis of Dasabuvir, an HCV-Polymerase Inhibitor.

Dasabuvir (1) is an HCV polymerase inhibitor which has been developed as a part of a three-component direct-acting antiviral combination therapy. During the course of the development of the synthetic route, two novel coupling reactions were developed. First, the copper-catalyzed coupling of uracil with aryl iodides, employing picolinamide 16 as the ligand, was discovered.

A general method for the synthesis of unsymmetrically substituted ureas via palladium-catalyzed amidation.

A general and practical method for the preparation of unsymmetrically substituted ureas has been developed utilizing palladium-catalyzed amidation. Both aryl bromides and chlorides, as well as heteroaryl chlorides, have been coupled to aryl, benzyl, and aliphatic ureas by using a novel nonproprietary bipyrazole ligand (bippyphos).