A new flexible approach for the stereoselective synthesis of substituted 1H-pyrrol-2(5H)-ones and 3,6-dihydro-1H-pyridin-2-ones has been developed. The general strategy employed the stereoselective reduction of a series of α,β-unsaturated ketones under chelation control to give the corresponding allylic alcohols. Overman rearrangement to install the key C-N bond followed by conversion to either prop-2-enoyl or but-3-enoyl derivatives and a ring closing metathesis reaction gave the target unsaturated γ- and δ-lactams. The synthetic utility of these compounds as building blocks was demonstrated by the preparation of the N-Boc derivative of (-)-coniine.

A base-mediated 6-endo-trig cyclization of readily accessible enone-derived α-amino acids has been developed for the direct synthesis of novel 2,6-cis-6substituted-4-oxo-L-pipecolic acids. A range of aliphatic and aryl side chains were tolerated by this mild procedure to give the target compounds in good overall yields. Molecular modeling of the 6-endo-trig cyclization allowed some insight as to how these compounds were formed, with the enolate intermediate generated via an equilibrium process, followed by irreversible tautomerization/neutralization providing the driving force for product formation. Stereoselective reduction and deprotection of the resulting 2,6-cis-6-substituted 4-oxo-L-pipecolic acids to the corresponding 4-hydroxy-L-pipecolic acids was also performed.

A general stereoselective synthesis of functionalized γ‐ and δ‐lactams using the Overman rearrangement to install the key C—N bond and a ring closing metathesis reaction to form the ring is developed.