CARBOHYDRATES AS CHIRAL AUXILIARIES IN STEREOSELECTIVE SYNTHESIS

Carbohydrates are inexpensive natural products in which numerous functional groups and stereogenic centers are combined in one molecule. By directed regio- and stereoselective formation of derivatives they can be converted into efficient chiral auxiliaries for controlling asymmetric syntheses. Stereoelectronic effects and pre-orientation of the reactive and shielding groups through formation of complexes can often be used for effective diastereofacial differentiation. In aldol reactions and alkylations on carbohydrate ester enolates intramolecular complexation promotes simultaneous elimination with formation of ketene. The steric, stereoelectronic, and coordinating properties of carbohydrate templates can also be used selectively to attain high levels of asymmetric induction in processes such as Diels-Alder reactions, hetero-Diels-Alder reactions, [2 + 2] cycloadditions, cyclopropanations, and Michael additions. It was possible with bicyclic, strongly stereodifferentiating carbohydrate auxiliaries to achieve a diastereoselective synthesis of carboxylic acid derivatives branched in the beta position by a new 1,4-addition of alkylaluminum halides to alpha,beta-unsaturated N-acyl-urethanes, in which methylaluminum halides and higher alkyl- or arylaluminum compounds behave mechanistically in a strikingly different manners. As complex ligands in chiral reagents and promoters, carbohydrates allow highly stereoselective reductions and aldol reactions that lead, amongst others, to chiral alcohols and beta-hydroxy-alpha-amino acids in excellent enantiomeric excesses. Glycosylamines offer the possibility of versatile stereoselective applications: in the presence of Lewis acids the corresponding aldimines permit high-yielding syntheses of enantiomerically pure alpha-amino acids by Strecker and Ugi reactions, controlled by steric and stereoelectronic effects and by complex formation. They can be used with equal efficiency for asymmetric syntheses of chiral homoallylamines and for asymmetric Mannich syntheses of beta-amino acids and chiral heterocycles, for example alkaloids.