No abstract

Depending on the reaction conditions and the nature of substituents at the triple bond, anionic cyclizations of hydrazides of o-acetylenyl benzoic acids can be selectively directed along three alternative paths, each of which provides efficient access to a different class of nitrogen heterocycles. The competition between 5-exo and 6-endo cyclizations of the "internal" nitrogen nucleophile is controlled by the nature of alkyne substituents under the kinetic control conditions. In the presence of KOH, the initially formed 5-exo products undergo a new rearrangement that involves a ring-opening followed by recyclization to the formal 6-exo-products and rendered irreversible by a prototropic isomerization. DFT computations provide insight into the nature of factors controlling relative rates of 5-exo, 6-endo, and 6-exo cyclization paths, ascertain the feasibility of direct 6-exo closure and relative stability for the anionic precursor for this process, provide, for the first time, the benchmark data for several classes of anionic nitrogen cyclizations, and dissect stereoelectronic effects controlling relative stability of cyclic anionic intermediates and influencing reaction stereoselectivity. We show that the stability gain due transformation of a weak pi-bond into a stronger sigma-bond (the usual driving force for the cyclizations of alkynes) is offset in this case by the transformation of a stable nitrogen anion into an inherently less stable carbanionic center. As a result, the cyclizations are much more sensitive to external conditions and substituents than similar cyclizations of neutral species. However, the exothermicity of such anionic cyclizations is increased dramatically upon prototropic isomerization of the initially formed carbanions into the more stable N-anions. Such tautomerizations are likely to play the key role in driving such cyclizations to completion but may also prevent future applications of such processes as the first step in domino cyclization processes.

Reactions between Cu(hfac)2 and nitronyl nitroxide biradicals 1,4-bis[4-(4,4,5,5-tetramethyl-3-oxide-1-oxyl-4,5-dihydro-1H-imidazol-2-yl)pyrazol-1-yl]butane (L4) and 1,8-bis[4-(4,4,5,5-tetramethyl-3-oxide-1-oxyl-4,5-dihydro-1H-imidazol-2-yl)pyrazol-1-yl]octane (L8) gave respectively a framework compound [Cu(hfac)2]2L4 and a layered polymer compound [Cu(hfac)2]2L8. The framework of [Cu(hfac)2]2L4 consists of 66-membered condensed metallocycles. Inside the framework, the structure has macrohelixes (pitch approximately 25 A) extending along the [001] crystallographic direction. All the helixes have the same direction of winding; the crystals, therefore, are optically active, the structure corresponding either to P-isomer (P4(1)2(1)2) or to M-isomer (P4(3)2(1)2). The long distances between the Cu atoms and the O atoms of the coordinated >N-O groups (Cu-O 2.351-2.467 A) are responsible for ferromagnetic exchange interactions in Cu2+-O-N< and >N-O-Cu2+-O-N< exchange clusters.

The high energy packed in alkyne functional group makes alkyne reactions highly thermodynamically favorable and generally irreversible. Furthermore, the presence of two orthogonal π-bonds that can be manipulated separately enables flexible synthetic cascades stemming from alkynes. Behind these “obvious” traits, there are other more subtle, often concealed aspects of this functional group’s appeal. This review is focused on yet another interesting but underappreciated alkyne feature: the fact that the CC alkyne unit has the same oxidation state as the -CH2C(O)- unit of a typical carbonyl compound. Thus, “classic carbonyl chemistry” can be accessed through alkynes, and new transformations can be engineered by unmasking the hidden carbonyl nature of alkynes. The goal of this review is to illustrate the advantages of using alkynes as an entry point to carbonyl reactions while highlighting reports from the literature where, sometimes without full appreciation, the concept of using alkynes as a hidden entry into carbonyl chemistry has been applied.

This contribution reports the design and synthesis of a series of spin-labeled charge acceptors to produce three-spin systems of "radical ion/biradical ion" type in X-irradiated alkane liquids. This opens the way to study spin triads in experimental conditions, in which short-lived radical ion pairs are conventionally studied, thus offering optically detected techniques such as magneto-resonance OD ESR and level-crossing MARY spectroscopy. The structure of the synthesized 2-imidazoline-1-oxyl derivatives is A-Sp-R, where A is a positive or negative charge acceptor, R is a stable radical, and Sp is a hydrocarbon bridge. The set of 20+ compounds represent a convenient tool to construct experimental three-spin systems with various properties, e.g. with the "third" spin introduced into one or the other partner of the radical ion pair. The degree of exchange coupling between the two paramagnetic fragments in the biradical ion has been demonstrated to strongly depend on the type of the radical fragment R and the structure of the bridge Sp. As a result, a series of acceptors with systematically reduced exchange interaction has been synthesized, and optimal systems for the observation of low magnetic field effect have been found. In the most favorable case, an OD ESR signal from a spin triad living as short as ca. 100 ns has been registered as a single unresolved line. The exchange integral for this biradical anion (9) was estimated from OD ESR and ESR experiments to be ca. 10(3) G by the order of magnitude, which is much greater than the hyperfine couplings in the biradical ion but much smaller than the thermal energy kT.

The reaction of diaryl ketoalkynes with 1,2-diamino ethane leads to the full scission of the triple bond with the formation of acetophenone and imidazoline fragments. In this transformation, one of the alkyne carbons undergoes formal reduction with the formation of three C-H bonds, whereas the other carbon undergoes formal oxidation via the formation of three C-N bonds (one π and two σ). Computational analysis confirmed that the key fragmentation step proceeds via a six-membered TS in a concerted manner. Both amines are involved in the fragmentation: the N-H moiety of one amine transfers a proton to the developing negative charge at the enolate oxygen, while the other amine provides direct stereoelectronic assistance to the C-C bond cleavage via a hyperconjugative n(N) → σ*(C-C) interaction.

The peculiarities of spin effects in photoinduced electron transfer (ET) in diastereomers of donor-acceptor dyads are considered in order to study the influence of chirality on reactivity. Thus, the spin selectivity—the difference between the enhancement coefficients of chemically induced dynamic nuclear polarization (CIDNP)—of the dyad’s diastereomers reflects the difference in the spin density distribution in its paramagnetic precursors that appears upon UV irradiation. In addition, the CIDNP coefficient itself has demonstrated a high sensitivity to the change of chiral centers: when one center is changed, the hyperpolarization of all polarized nuclei of the molecule is affected. The article analyzes the experimental values of spin selectivity based on CIDNP calculations and molecular dynamic modeling data in order to reveal the effect of optical configuration on the structure and reactivity of diastereomers. In this way, we succeeded in tracing the differences in dyads with L- and D-tryptophan as an electron donor. Since the replacement of L-amino acid with D-analog in specific proteins is believed to be the cause of Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases, spin effects and molecular dynamic simulation in model dyads can be a useful tool for investigating the nature of this phenomenon.

This work analyzes multiple new reaction pathways which originate from intramolecular reactions of activated alkynes with the appropriately positioned multifunctional hemiaminal moiety. Combination of experimental substituent effects with Natural Bond Orbital (NBO) analysis revealed that alkyne polarization controls partitioning between these cascades. A particularly remarkable transformation leads to the formation of six new bonds at the two alkyne carbons due to complete disassembly of the alkyne moiety and formal insertion of a nitrogen atom between the two acetylenic carbons of the reactant. This reaction offers a new synthetic approach for the preparation of polycyclic aromatic amides with a number of possible applications in molecular electronics. Another of the newly discovered cascades opens access to substituted analogues of Sampangine alkaloids which are known for their antifungal and antimycobacterial activity against AIDS-related opportunistic infection pathogens.