Ring-Opening Metathesis/Oxy-Cope Rearrangement: A New Strategy for the Synthesis of Bicyclic Medium Ring-Containing Compounds

Ring-opening/ring-closing metathesis on cyclobutene-containing substrates with angular oxygen functionality provides a stereospecific introduction of 1,5-bis-dienes required for an anion-accelerated oxy-Cope rearrangement. The reaction sequence offers generally a stereocontrolled preparation of a variety of medium ring-containing bicyclic ring systems, while rearrangement to the bicyclo[7,3,0]dodecane (9-5) system leads to a mixture of olefin isomers.