Vinyl MIDA boronate: a readily accessible and highly versatile building block for small molecule synthesis

Iterative cross-coupling represents a potentially general approach for the simple, efficient, and flexible construction of natural products, pharmaceuticals, and materials. N-Methyliminodiacetic acid (MIDA) boronates represent a promising platform for the development of this type of synthesis strategy. This report describes the discovery that vinyl MIDA boronate (1) is an airand chromatographically stable compound that can be conveniently prepared on a multigram scale and serve as a versatile starting material for the preparation of a range of new MIDA boronate building blocks. Analogous to tert-butylethylene, 1 is also an excellent substrate for olefin cross-metathesis, providing access to a range of trans-alkenyl MIDA boronates as single stereoisomers. An improved synthesis of the very versatile bifunctional building block trans-(2-bromovinyl) MIDA boronate (2) is also described. Collectively, these results contribute to the expanding generality of the iterative cross-coupling approach. 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.