Transition Metal Catalyzed Methods for Preparing Nitroalkanes and Alkyl Amines

描述（由申请人提供）：现代医学依赖于复杂有机分子的制备。这些化合物构成大多数药剂的有效成分。随着对更具选择性、更强效和更有效的药物需求的增加，越来越需要开发新的方法来有效地化学合成复杂的有机分子。烷基胺是许多主要药物制剂中常见的结构元素。虽然存在许多方法来构建它们，但许多方法依赖于常见的化学中间体（羰基化合物）作为起始材料。这种常见的化学原料限制了烷基胺的制备方法。因此，需要新的方法从其他前体制备这些分子。本文概述了两种用非羰基原料制备复杂烷基胺的新方法。所提出的方法的主题联系是利用过渡金属基催化剂来开发使用硝基烷烃起始材料合成胺的新方法。在Aim 1中，提出了一种使用简单铜催化剂进行硝基烷烃碳中心烷基化的新方法。这些反应的产物很容易转化为烷基胺。以前实现这种转化的方法依赖于实验要求苛刻的反应条件或使用复杂或高毒性试剂。通过对硝基烷烃c -烷基化反应条件的初步发现，提出了一种制备复杂硝基烷烃的通用方法。目标2概述了利用钌催化将硝基烷烃催化转化为对映体富集胺的方法的开发计划。这种新方法有望提供一条通往对映体富集胺的新途径，与现有方法高度互补，可以广泛地利用Aim 1的产物，以及现有方法制备的硝基烷烃。总的来说，拟议的方法预计将提供使用非传统起始材料获得复杂烷基胺的改进途径。这项工作将直接有利于复杂含氮有机分子的制备，并有助于发现下一代药物制剂。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Modern medicine is reliant on the preparation of complex organic molecules. These compounds comprise the active ingredients of most pharmaceutical agents. As the need for more selective, more potent, and more effective medicines increases, there is an ever-growing need to develop new methods for efficient chemical synthesis of complex organic molecules. Alkyl amines are a common structural element in many major pharmaceutical agents. Although numerous methods exist for their construction, many of these methods rely on common chemical intermediates (carbonyl compounds) as starting materials. This common chemical feedstock limits the ways in which alkyl amines can be prepared. Thus, there is need for new methods to prepare such molecules from other precursors. This proposal outlines two new methods to prepare complex alkyl amines using non-carbonyl starting materials. The thematic linkage of the proposed methods is the utilization of transition metal-based catalysts to develop new approaches to amine synthesis using nitroalkane starting materials. In Aim 1, a new approach to the carbon-centered alkylation of nitroalkanes using simple copper catalysts is proposed. The products from these reactions are readily converted into alkyl amines. Previous methods to achieve this transformation relied on experimentally demanding reaction conditions or on the use of either complex or highly toxic reagents. Based on our preliminary discovery of mild reaction conditions for the C-alkylation of nitroalkanes using abundant alkyl halides, a general method to prepare complex nitroalkanes is proposed. Aim 2 outlines plans for the development of a method for the catalytic conversion of nitroalkanes into enantioenriched amines using ruthenium catalysis. This new method promises to provide a new route into enantioenriched amines that is highly complementary to existing methods and can be broadly leveraged against the products from Aim 1, as well as nitroalkanes prepared by existing methods. In total, the proposed methodology is expected to provide improved access to complex alkyl amines using non-traditional starting materials. This effort will directly benefit the preparation of complex nitrogen-bearing organic molecules and aid in the discovery of the next generation of pharmaceutical agents.