Continuous Flow-Processing of Organometallic Reagents Using an Advanced Peristaltic Pumping System and the Telescoped Flow Synthesis of (E/Z)-Tamoxifen

• Philip R D Murray
• Duncan L Browne
• Julio C Pastre
• Chris Butters
• Duncan Guthrie
• Steven V Ley

• Department of Chemistry, University of Cambridge, UK Instituto de Química, University of Campinas, Brazil Vapourtec Ltd, UK

A new enabling technology for the pumping of organometallic reagents such as n-butyllithium, Grignard reagents, and DIBAL-H is reported, which utilises a newly developed, chemically resistant, peristaltic pumping system. Several representative examples of its use in common transformations using these reagents, including metal–halogen exchange, addition, addition–elimination, conjugate addition, and partial reduction, are reported along with examples of telescoping of the anionic reaction products. This platform allows for truly continuous pumping of these highly reactive substances (and examples are demonstrated over periods of several hours) to generate multigram quantities of products. This work culminates in an approach to the telescoped synthesis of (E/Z)-tamoxifen using continuous-flow organometallic reagent-mediated transformations.

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