Polymer-Supported Chiral Co(Salen) Complexes: Synthetic Applications and Mechanistic Investigations in the Hydrolytic Kinetic Resolution of Terminal Epoxides

This paper describes the synthesis of polystyrene- and silica-bound chiral Co(salen) complexes and their application in asymmetric catalysis. A general method for the covalent attachment of salen complexes to both types of support has been devised, and the corresponding immobilized cobalt derivatives are shown to be efficient and highly enantioselective catalysts for the hydrolytic kinetic resolution (HKR) of terminal epoxides. These systems provide practical solutions to certain technical difficulties associated with the isolation of reaction products from the HKR. Removal of the supported catalyst by filtration and repeated recycling is demonstrated with no loss of reactivity or enantioselectivity. The enantioselective addition of phenols to terminal epoxides mediated by this catalyst system provides a facile, high-yielding synthesis of the corresponding enantioenriched aryl ethers. The immobilized catalysts have been adapted to a continuous flow process for the generation of reaction products in high yield and ee, requiring only very simple techniques for product purification. The mechanism by which these catalysts perform highly efficient and enantioselective epoxide ring opening has been addressed using a silica-bound Co(salen) complex. A dramatic corrrelation between the degree of catalyst site-isolation and reaction rate has been observed, consistent with a cooperative bimetallic mechanism in these reactions.