title: Enediynes in 11-membered rings. Synthesis, structure, and reactivity of highly strained but unusually stable macrocycles.
abstract: The synthesis of two new aromatic cyclic enediynes 1a and 1b using a double Wittig condensation, followed by bromination and di-dehydrobromination, is reported. The structures were determined using X-ray crystallography. The observed C(1)-C(6) distances of the enediyne moiety in the oxygen- and sulfur-containing eleven-membered rings are quite short with 3.44 and 3.50 A, respectively, indicating the highly strained nature of these compounds. Isodesmic calculations at the B3LYP/6-31G level of theory indicate a strain energy of 8.2 and 5.8 kcal/mol, respectively. Despite the highly strained ring system, the compounds were found to be stable under thermal, photochemical, and electron-transfer conditions. Using BLYP/6-311+G/BLYP/6-31G calculations, the origin of this unusual stability was traced to the high energy of the 1,4 benzyne diradicals formed via Bergman cyclization. For the radical cation, both the C(1)-C(6) and the C(1)-C(5) cyclization mode previously reported for acyclic analogues of 1 were found to be energetically prohibitive.
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, Indiana 46556-5670, USA.
authors.forename: Holger
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Wandel
authors.forename: Olaf
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Wiest