Computational study on the mechanism of transition metal-catalyzed formation of highly substituted furo [3,4-d] [1,2] oxazines

Abstract

The mechanism of gold(III)-catalyzed 1,3-dipolar [[Formula: see text]] cycloaddition reactions of 2-(1-alkynyl)-2-alken-1-ones with nitrones to afford highly-substituted furo [3,4-d] [1,2] oxazines, which are useful as structural skeletons in biologically active compounds and as synthetic building blocks in organic synthesis, have been studied computationally. The results show that the reaction proceeds via the formation of a [Formula: see text]-complex in which the gold moiety coordinates to the triple bond of the 2-(1-alkynyl)-2-alken-1-ones, resulting in an intramolecular cyclization of the gold intermediate to generate a carbocation intermediate which is trapped by the nucleophilic oxygen of the nitrone to form a furanyl–gold complex, which upon subsequent cyclization affords the furo [3,4-d] [1,2] oxazine as well as regenerates the gold catalyst. The highest activation barrier in the entire cycle is 19.5[Formula: see text]kcal/mol which accompanies the intramolecular cyclization step. The activation barriers for the reactions of 2-(1-alkynyl)2-alken-1-ones with electron-donating and cyclic substituents are generally lower compared to those of the parent 2-(1-alkynyl)2-alken-1-one while the reactions of 2-(1-alkynyl)2-alken-1-ones with electron-withdrawing substituents have higher activation barriers. Preliminary exploratory calculations on the possibility of replacing gold, an expensive and rare metal, with a copper-based catalyst for the reaction, show that for the key elementary steps, the Cu (III) catalyst is at least as active as the Au (III) complex, thus providing a cheaper route to furo [3,4-d] [1,2] oxazine.