Methyl α-methylene-β-tert-butyldimethylsilyloxycarboxylate esters are found to undergo diastereoselective epoxidation in the presence of potassium tert-butoxide-tert-butyl hydroperoxide to form anti products. In an effort to better understand mechanistic details of the transformation and the basis of diastereoselectivities observed, we studied the epoxidation of substrates with α-methylene groups containing (trans) deuterium labels and discovered that oxygen-atom transfer proceeds with ≥95% stereospecificity in all cases examined. These and other experiments suggest that the mechanism of epoxidation is not distinguishable from a concerted process.In the context of a problem in target-directed, complex synthesis we were led to explore the epoxidation of methyl α-methylene-β-hydroxycarboxylate esters and their hydroxyl-protected derivatives, and report here that the corresponding tert-butyldimethylsilyl ethers undergo efficient, anti-selective epoxidation with potassium tert-butylperoxide in tetrahydrofuran (THF). While syn-selective epoxidations of α-methylene-β-hydroxy-carboxylate esters have been reported, 1 a method for anti-selective epoxidation of this substrate class had not been described previously. Figure 1 are results of epoxidations of nine methyl α-methylene-β-tertbutyldimethyl-silyloxycarboxylate esters bearing different β-alkyl substituents. All transformations employed stoichiometric amounts of tert-butyl hydroperoxide and catalytic quantities of potassium tert-butoxide (0.1-0.3 equiv) in THF at 0 °C. 2 Substrates with dimethoxymethyl, benzyloxymethyl, or unsaturated β-substituents reacted relatively rapidly, while those with cyclohexyl, ethyl, or 2-benzyloxyethyl β-substituents reacted more slowly, and required distributed addition of as much as 0.3 equiv of potassium tert-butoxide to achieve complete conversion. All reactions were complete within 12 h at 0 °C, provided that care was taken to thoroughly dry all substrates, reagents, and solvents (see Supporting Information). As summarized in Figure 1, anti products were formed selectively in all cases. Substrates with unsaturated β-substituents were epoxidized with somewhat lower selectivities, which evidence suggests may be due in part to a stereoelectronic effect (vide infra). In an important early finding, Tanaka et al. showed that 1,2-disubstituted allylic alcohols undergo syn-selective epoxidation in the presence of vanadium acetylacetonate and tert-butyl hydroperoxide. 3 Later, Baylis-Hillman products were shown to undergo syn-selective epoxidation with both vanadium-and titanium-based reagents. 1 We used the latter method to obtain authentic samples of the syn diastereomers for two of the examples of Figure 1, with the results shown in eqs 1 and 2 below. Interestingly, but not unexpectedly, the rates of epoxidations mediated by potassium tert-butoxide and titanium tetraisopropoxide varied inversely with substrates bearing electron-donating and electron-withdrawing β-substituents. Substrates in Figure 1 with more electron-withdrawin...