On the Products Obtained from γ-Oxygen Substituted Crotonaldehyde in Fermenting Baker's Yeast

Experiments with a series of γ-oxygen substituted crotonaldehyde derivatives, bearing different substituents in α, β and γ-positions, and designed to determine the structural factors enabling, in fermenting baker's yeast, transformation pathways involving either decarboxylative incorporation of pyruvate (Scheme 2) or stereospecifk water addition-reduction (Scheme 3), indicate that the latter events are possible only with γy-benzoyloxy and γ-benzyloxy crotonaldehyde.