Access to optically pure 4- and 5-substituted lactones: a case of chemical-biocatalytical cooperation.

Optically pure or highly enantiomerically enriched 4- and 5-substituted lactones are rather difficult to obtain. Chemical or enzymatic syntheses alone are not particularly successful. A combination of chemical catalysis and biocatalysis, however, provides a convenient route to a variety of these useful chiral compounds.

Conjugate reduction of alpha,beta-unsaturated carbonyl compounds catalyzed by a copper carbene complex.

[reaction: see text] An N-heterocyclic carbene copper chloride (NHC-CuCl) complex (2) has been prepared and used to catalyze the conjugate reduction of alpha,beta-unsaturated carbonyl compounds. The combination of catalytic amounts of 2 and NaOt-Bu with poly(methylhydrosiloxane) (PMHS) as the stoichiometric reductant generates an active catalyst for the 1,4-reduction of tri- and tetrasubstituted alpha,beta-unsaturated esters and cyclic enones. The active catalytic species can also be generated in situ from 1,3-bis(2,6-di-isopropylphenyl)-imidazolium chloride (1) CuCl(2).

Dynamic kinetic resolution via asymmetric conjugate reduction: enantio- and diastereoselective synthesis of 2,4-dialkyl cyclopentanones.

Herein, we report the kinetic and the dynamic kinetic resolutions of racemic 3,5-dialkyl-2-cyclopenten-1-ones. Kinetic resolution, with good selectivity factors (25-52), was achieved by conjugate reduction with catalytic CuCl/NaOt-Bu/(S)-p-tol-BINAP and stoichiometric quantities of poly(methylhydrosiloxane) (PMHS). When stoichiometric amounts of NaOt-Bu and t-BuOH were included in the reaction mixture, rapid racemization of the starting material occurred allowing for the dynamic kinetic resolution of the cyclopentenone substrates.