A reductive coupling strategy towards ripostatin A

Synthetic studies on the antibiotic natural product ripostatin A have been carried out with the aim to construct the C9-C10 bond by a nickel(0)-catalyzed coupling reaction of an enyne and an epoxide, followed by rearrangement of the resulting dienylcyclopropane intermediate to afford the skipped 1,4,7-triene. A cyclopropyl enyne fragment corresponding to C1-C9 has been synthesized in high yield and demonstrated to be a competent substrate for the nickel(0)-catalyzed coupling with a model epoxide. Several synthetic approaches toward the C10-C26 epoxide have been pursued. The C13 stereocenter can be set by allylation and reductive decyanation of a cyanohydrin acetonide. A mild, fluoride-promoted decarboxylation enables construction of the C15-C16 bond by an aldol reaction. The product of this transformation is of the correct oxidation state and potentially three steps removed from the targeted epoxide fragment.