A highly chemo-, regio-, and stereoselective metallacycle-mediated annulation between a conjugated enyne and an ene-diyne

Alkoxide-directed metal-centered intermolecular [2+2+2] annulation is shown to chemo-, regio-, and stereoselectively engage two polyunsaturated substrates in productive cyclization chemistry. This annulation process is unique in the field, revealing that it is possible to selectively engage three of five π -systems residing in the coupling partners in initial [2+2+2] reaction, and demonstrating that one of the two remaining π - systems (the TMS-alkyne) can ultimately serve to simply generate a new metallacyclopentene of great potential value in additional metallacycle-mediated coupling chemistry.


Introduction
][9][10][11][12][13] While many of these advances have been demonstrated to be of great value in complex molecule or natural product synthesis, 14 it is typically the case that intermolecular versions of this type of organometallic chemistry are rather restricted in scope, and therefore of limited value in stereoselective synthesis, including natural product synthesis. 14As illustrated in Figure 1B, controlling intermolecular reactivity in metallacycle-mediated coupling chemistry is challenging due to the possibility of generating products of varied composition, in addition to the clear issues of selectivity that surface when employing: (a) unsymmetrical systems (regioselectivity), (b) alkenes as one of the three reactive π-systems (π-facial selectivity), and/or (c) polyunsaturated substrates where issues of chemoselectivity surface.For over ten years, we have been interested in establishing principles that ultimately result in avoiding the common dependence on intramolecularity and/or use of symmetrical substrates in this rather broad area of chemistry.][30][31][32] Here, in efforts that aimed to explore the question of whether it is possible to chemoselectively engage two polyunsaturated substrates in metallacycle-mediated annulative cross-coupling, we have elucidated the first organometallic transformation of its kind, where four of five resident π-unsaturations in the overall reaction are embraced as sites of reactivity in a highly selective annulation reaction (Figure 2B).

Results and Discussion
Figure 2. Alkoxide-directed metallacycle-mediated annulative cross-coupling and selective engagement of a subset of π-systems resident in polyunsaturated substrates.
To explore the coupling reaction depicted in Figure 2B, efforts were first directed toward the synthesis of the desired ene-diyne 13.As illustrated in Figure 3A, epichlorohydrin was easily advanced to the desired enediyne 13 by initial reaction with isopropenylmagnesium bromide and CuI, followed by treatment with base to generate the low molecular weight alkenyl epoxide 16. 33 With this intermediate in hand, regioselective opening of the epoxide with the Li-acetylide of diyne 17, promoted by the action of BF3•OEt2, delivered the desired coupling partner 13 in 66% yield.
Ti-mediated annulation was then pursued as depicted in Figure 3B.Initial chemoselective activation of the commercially available enyne 12 by the action of Ti(Oi-Pr)4 and n-BuLi, followed by addition of the lithium alkoxide of ene-diyne 13 as a solution in PhMe, and quenching of the reaction with aqueous NaHCO3, resulted in the formation of the cross-conjugated triene-containing hydrindane 14, isolated in 51% yield as a single regio-and stereoisomer -no evidence was found for the formation of any other isomer of this coupled product, nor was evidence found for the presence of the TMS-alkyne containing product 15. 32s depicted in Figure 3C, a mechanistic rationale for the formation of 14 is based on initial alkoxidedirected reaction between the preformed Ti-alkyne complex of 12 (I) with the internal alkyne of ene-diyne 13 that is proximal to the hydroxy group.The resulting fully substituted metallacyclopentadiene (III) can then participate in stereoselective intramolecular [4+2] to deliver the bridged bicyclic metallacyclopentene intermediate IV.We currently believe that this intermediate serves as the source of Ti for ligand transfer to the third reactive alkyne of this substrate combination (the TMS-alkyne of the ene-diyne coupling partner 13), resulting in the intermediacy of a new titanacyclopropene intermediate (VI).Interestingly, this intermediate organometallic does not appear competent to engage the 1,1-disubstituted alkene in carbometalation chemistry en route to the generation of a new carbocyclic system (VI  VII  15). 34Rather, aqueous quenching of this reaction delivers the tricycylic product 14 that contains a pendent (Z)-vinylsilane.

Conclusions
A unique and highly selective intermolecular [2+2+2] annulation reaction of polyunsaturated substrates has been described.The reaction is believed to be possible due to the power of alkoxide-direction as a force to control the regio-and stereochemical course of metallacycle-mediated coupling reactions.Observations made in the course of this study have led to the hypothesis that a pendent alkyne on the enyne substrate has the potential to engage the bridged bicyclic organometallic intermediate generated in the course of [2+2+2] annulation in a simple ligand exchange reaction, and defines a unique sequence of chemical transformations of potential value in more complex multi-component coupling chemistry.We look forward to exploring the value of this new sequence for addressing challenging problems associated with the synthesis of terpenoid and terpenoid-inspired targets.