One of the main challenges associated with creating a bifunctional
hybrid catalyst is the need to keep the Lewis acid and
Lewis base moieties from reacting with each other, while at the
same time positioning them close enough in space to facilitate
the key bond formation between nucleophile and electrophile.
To meet these requirements, we have focused on the preparation
of five-membered heterocycles that are capable of complexing
Lewis acidic metals, and we have prepared a focused
library of bifunctional precatalysts possessing these heterocycles
tethered to several amines capable of enamine formation (Fig. 1,
bottom).
2.1. Azoleecarboxylate precatalysts
Our first series of bifunctional precatalysts are derived from
chiral a-amino acids and possess oxazoleecarboxylate chelating
functionality. The synthesis of our first precatalyst in this category
is outlined in Scheme 1.
The synthesis started with a peptide coupling between N-Boc-Lproline
and L-threonine methyl ester hydrochloride, which afforded
the known dipeptide 3 in moderate yield. The dipeptide was oxidized
to ketone 4 with Dess-Martin Periodinane (DMP), then subjected
to a cyclization reaction with conditions developed by Wipf
(triphenylphosphine, iodine, and triethylamine)28 to generate the
protected oxazole 5 in 52% yield. Lithium hydroxide hydrolysis of
the methyl ester followed by acid-mediated removal of the Boc
group afforded amino acid oxazole 7 as the HCl salt in good yield.
The limited solubility of putative amino acid precatalysts such as
7 in low polarity solvents inspired us to prepare variants with lipophilic
solubility handles. For example, the use of 4-
hydroxyproline as a starting material permits the convenient incorporation
of lipophilic groups that would be expected to have
a negligible impact on catalysis. The benzyl ether of N-Boc-L-proline
(1b) was coupled with L-serine methyl ester to yield dipeptide 9b in
excellent yield. Cyclization of 9b to generate an oxazoline with
Deoxo-Fluor was followed by in-situ bromination/elimination to
form oxazole 10b, according to a protocol reported by Wipf and
Williams,29 which we modified slightly to incorporate an aqueous
wash between steps. The methyl ester 10b was hydrolyzed to yield
acid 11b, which could be coupled with additional building blocks
(vide infra), or the Boc group could be removed with HCl to give
amino acid 11b. An identical sequence was also used to prepare an
intermediate without a solubility handle (11a). Valine-based precatalysts
were also prepared in a similar manner, via Boc-protected
compound 14 (Scheme 3).