Allylsilanes in the synthesis of three to seven membered rings: the silylcuprate strategy

Allylsilane as a versatile handle in photoredox catalysis

Organosilanes have secured a special place in the synthetic world for several decades. However, among them, allylsilanes are a choice reagent for organic chemists to develop novel organic transformations. In recent years researchers have proved that visible-light photoredox catalysis has emerged as one of the most mild, sustainable, straightforward, and efficient strategies to construct simple to complex molecules with or without enantioselectivity. This review provides an in-depth analysis of recent advances and strategies employed in visible-light photoredox catalysis for allylsilane and its analogues for the development of various organic transformations. The review is divided into sections, each focused on a specific reactivity of allylsilane under light irradiation with C(sp2) center arene or alkene, C(sp2) center carbonyl, and C(sp3) center carbon functionality. In this review, we present optimization data, reaction scope, and mechanistic aspects to bring forward specific reactivity and selectivity trends of allylsilane in photoredox conditions.

Enantioselective one-carbon expansion of aromatic rings by simultaneous formation and chromoselective irradiation of a transient coloured enolate

Enantioenriched seven-membered carbocycles are motifs in many molecules of structural and biological interest. We report a simple, practical, transition metal-free and mechanistically unusual method for the enantioselective synthesis of substituted cycloheptatrienes. By forming a coloured enolate with an appropriate absorption band and selectively irradiating in situ, we to initiate a tandem, asymmetric anionic and photochemical ring expansion of readily accessible N-benzylbenzamides. The cascade of reactions leading to the products entails enantioselective benzylic deprotonation with a chiral lithium amide, dearomatizing cyclization of the resulting configurationally defined organolithium to give an extended amide enolate, and photochemically induced formal [1,7]-sigmatropic rearrangement and 6π-electrocyclic ring-opening - the latter all evidently being stereospecific - to deliver enantioenriched cycloheptatrienes with embedded benzylic stereocentres.