Catalytic Reactions Directed by a Structurally Well-Defined Aminomethyl Cyclopalladated Complex

The introduction of N-containing moieties into feedstock molecules to build nitrogenated functional molecules has always been widely studied by the organic chemistry community. Progress in this field paves new roads to the synthesis of N-containing molecules, which are of significant importance in biological activities and play vital roles in pharmaceuticals and functional materials. Remarkable progress has been achieved in the field of transition metal-catalyzed C-N bond-forming reactions, typified by alkene hydroamination and the aza-Wacker reaction. However, the poisoning effect of electron-donating amine substrates on late transition metal catalysts presents a key impediment to these reactions, thus limiting the scope of amine substrates to electron-deficient amide derivatives. To address this problem, our group developed a palladium-aminomethyl complex with a three-membered palladacycle structure that allowed for the incorporation of electron-rich amine building blocks via C-C bond instead of C-N bond construction. This Account details the discovery of the well-defined aminomethyl cyclopalladated complex and recapitulates its applications for the catalysis of a series of aminomethylation reactions. We highlight how the understanding of the fundamental structural properties of the defined complex guided us toward tuning the reactivity of nucleophiles to initiate aminomethylation in different modes. Moreover, principles of designing and establishing further cascade reactions are also described.Aminomethyl cyclopalladated complexes can be prepared via the oxidative addition of aminals or N,O-acetals to Pd⁰ species. Thorough structural investigations by single-crystal X-ray diffraction analysis of the cyclopalladated complex suggest the presence of both aminomethylene-Pd^II (3-membered-ring) and Pd⁰-iminium (π-ligated) resonance forms, which indicates that both the palladium center and the methylene site are electrophilic. This is further verified by analysis of charge distribution. Two general types of reactions can be established, differing by the selective affinity of the nucleophiles to the two electrophilic positions, which is relevant to the "hardness suitability" of the nucleophiles with each electrophilic site. Softer nucleophiles such as alkenes prefer to attack the palladium center to initiate the reaction, mainly via migratory insertion into the Pd-C bond on the 3-membered ring with high strain. Through tandem β-hydride or reductive elimination, the Heck-type aminomethylation of styrenes, the aminomethylalkoxylation of electron-rich olefins, and even the aminomethylamination of allenes, dienes, enynes, and carbenoids with full atom-economy have been realized in line with this reaction mode. In contrast, harder nucleophiles tend to attack the harder electrophilic methylene site, leading to the aminomethylation of electron-deficient dienes. For secondary amines, a "C-N bond metathesis" process would be furnished through a reductive elimination, 1,3-proton transfer, and oxidative addition sequence. More intriguingly, when using appropriate "dinucleophile" substrates such as electron-rich amine-tethered dienes, sequential C-N bond metathesis and intramolecular insertion would occur to furnish Pd-catalyzed annulation reactions, which exhibits both the hard and soft nucleophile reactivities mentioned above. These transformations provide convenient methods for the preparation of N-containing molecules, such as amines, diamines, amino acetals, and multiple types of N-heterocycles.