(Tributylstannyl)methyl 2,2,6,6-tetramethylpiperidine-1-carboxylate was metalated with t-BuLi/TMEDA at -78 degrees C and borylated with the mixed borate derived from (R,R)-1,2-dicyclohexylethane-1,2-diol and t-butanol to give diastereomeric boronates 31/32 in equal amounts. Boronates 31 and 32 were reduced with LiBEt3D and then oxidized with basic H2O2 to give (S)- and (R)-tributylstannyl-[1-2H1]methanol of 99% ee, respectively. Treatment of their respective phosphates with n-BuLi at -78 and 0 degrees C gave microscopically configurationally stable phosphinyloxy-substituted [2H1]methyllithiums, which rearranged to hydroxy-[1-2H1]methylphosphonates of ee > 98% (phosphate-phosphonate rearrangement). The N,N-diisopropylcarbamates of the enantiomeric tributylstannyl-[1-2H1]methanols were transmetalated to give carbamoyloxy-substituted chiral [2H1]methyllithiums, which were macroscopically configurationally stable for prolonged periods of time (up to 3 h, ee still 99%) at -78 degrees C, deduced from trapping experiments with benzaldehyde. The chemical stability of these methyllithiums ended at -50 degrees C. The stereochemistry of the monoprotected and monodeuterated 1-phenylethane-1,2-diols obtained was secured by spectroscopic comparison of their Mosher esters with that of all four stereoisomeric 1-phenyl-[1-2H1]ethane-1,2-diols synthesized independently. Furthermore, the configurations of the boronates and the chiral methyllithiums derived from them were deduced from a single-crystal X-ray structure analysis of a carbamate in which the tributylstannyl group had been replaced by the [(1R)-menthyl]dimethylstannyl group.

Two‐directional synthesis: Key steps in the first total synthesis of the anti‐inflammatory agent efomycine M (1) are a two‐directional C11–C12 chain elongation and an early‐stage dimerization reaction. The central stereopentad is synthesized by a highly stereoselective sequence consisting of an anti‐aldol reaction and a diastereoselective reduction.

An enantioselective synthesis of α-methylene-β-hydroxy carboxylic acid derivatives via a highly diastereoselective, one-pot syn-aldol and β-elimination sequence utilizing the chiral β-(phenylselenyl)propionyl imide 15 is described. This new method, which constitutes an alternative to the Baylis-Hillman reaction, has been applied to the synthesis of the C(15)-C(21) fragment of tedanolide C.

No abstract