Palladium/N-heterocyclic carbene catalysed regio and diastereoselective reaction of ketones with allyl reagents via inner-sphere mechanism

The palladium-catalysed allylic substitution reaction is one of the most important reactions in transition-metal catalysis and has been well-studied in the past decades. Most of the reactions proceed through an outer-sphere mechanism, affording linear products when monosubstituted allyl reagents are used. Here, we report an efficient Palladium-catalysed protocol for reactions of β-substituted ketones with monosubstituted allyl substrates, simply by using N-heterocyclic carbene as ligand, leading to branched products with up to three contiguous stereocentres in a ( syn, anti )-mode with excellent regio and diastereoselectivities. The scope of the protocol in organic synthesis has been examined preliminarily. Mechanistic studies by both experiments and density functional theory (DFT) calculations reveal that the reaction proceeds via an inner-sphere mechanism—nucleophilic attack of enolate oxygen on Palladium followed by C–C bond-forming [3,3’]-reductive elimination. Palladium catalyzed allylic substitution reactions typically proceed via an outer sphere mechanism, yielding predominately linear products. Here, the authors report an inner sphere process for the allylic substitution of ketone enolates, giving branched products with up to three contiguous stereocentres.