Additions to nonactivated olefins and dienes are important reactions in organic synthesis [ 11. Although cycloadditions may be used for additions to double bonds, the most common way to achieve such reactions is to activate the olefins with an electrophilic reagent. Electrophilic activation of the olefin or diene followed by a nucleophilic attack at one of the sp2 carbon atoms leads to a 1,2-or lA-addition. More recently, transition metals have been employed for the electrophilic activation of the double bond [2]. In particular, palladium(I1) salts are known to activate carbon-carbon double bonds toward nucleophilic attack [3] and this is the basis for the Wacker process for industrial oxidation of ethylene to acetaldehyde [4]. In this process, the key step is the nucleophilic attack by water on a (n-ethy1ene)palladium complex.Additions to conjugated dienes constitute a special class of reactions, in which it is of great importance to control the regioselectivity toward 1,2-or 1,4-addition. With classical electrophilic reagents, it is difficult to control the regioselectivity: often, mixtures of 1,2and 1,4-regioisomers are formed. With the use of transition metals, highly regioselective additions to conjugated dienes can sometimes be obtained [5]. From a synthetic point of view, this regioselectivity is of great importance if these additions are catalyzed by the metal. One metal that has been successfully used in this respect is palladium. Several reviews have included palladium-catalyzed additions to conjugated dienes [5-101. The present review deals with palladium-catalyzed reactions leading to selective bis-couplings in the 1and 4-positions of 1,3-dienes.Palladium-catalyzed 1,4-additions to conjugated dienes can be divided into two classes: (1) non-oxidation reactions that (2) oxidation reactions. In the former class, a palladium(0) catalyst is employed and the first step in the catalytic cycle is often an activation of one of the reactants by its oxidative addition to Pd(0). In the second class, a palladium(I1) complex is the active catalyst which oxidizes the substrate diene with formation of Pd(0). Reoxidation of Pd(0) to Pd(II) by an oxidant regenerates the active catalyst.
Palladium(0)-catalyzed ReactionsThese are non-oxidation reactions that can be divided into several subclasses. The active catalyst is a palladium(0) complex, such as Pd(PPh,), or some analogous phosphine complex. Such palladium(0)-phosphine complexes may also be generated in situ fromMetal-catalyzed Cross-coupling Reactions Edited by François Diederich, Peter J. Stang 340 8 Palladium-catulyzed 1,4-Additions the latter case Pd(I1) is reduced to Pd(0) by the phosphine [ 111. A common feature of the palladium(0)-catalyzed additions to conjugated dienes is that they begin with an oxidative addition of a species such as H-Nu or RX to palladium(0) to give a pdlladium(l1)-hydride complex or an organometallic R-Pd(I1) complex, respectively. These complexes subsequently react with the conjugated diene in a migratory insertion reaction to give...