Generation of functionalized azomethine ylides and their application to stereoselective heterocycle synthesis: an equivalent process of C-unsubstituted nitrile ylide cycloaddition reaction

The synthetic process equivalent to C-unsubstituted (CH) nitrile ylides cycloaddition reaction is achieved via cycloaddition of NH-azomethine ylide and the following fission reaction of the cycloadducts under acidic conditions. Cycloaddition of NH-azomethine ylide generated by a thermal 1,2-prototropy in 4-oxo-4H-pyrido[1,2-a]pyrimidine-3-carbaldehyde system with maleimides provides proline derivatives under extremely mild conditions. Heating their adducts in AcOH at 85 °C causes a cleavage of C–C bond between the proline and heterocyclic moiety to give the parent heterocyclic system and dehydroproline derivatives, which is regarded as a cycloadduct of C-unsubstituted (CH) nitrile ylide. This cycloaddition–fission reaction sequences can be applied to one-pot three-component reaction.