Regiodivergent Radical Termination for Intermolecular Biocatalytic C–C Bond Formation

Radical hydrofunctionalizations of electronically unbiased dienes are challenging to render regioselective, because the products are nearly identical in energy. Here, we report two engineered FMN-dependent “ene”-reductases (EREDs) that catalyze regiodivergent hydroalkylations of cyclic and linear dienes. While previous studies focused exclusively on the stereoselectivity of alkene hydroalkylation, this work highlights that EREDs can control the regioselectivity of hydrogen atom transfer, providing a method for selectively preparing constitutional isomers that would be challenging to prepare using traditional synthetic methods. Engineering the ERED from Gluconabacter sp. (GluER) furnished a variant that favors the γ,δ-unsaturated ketone, while an engineered variant from a commercial ERED panel favors the δ,ε-unsaturated ketone. The effect of beneficial mutations has been investigated using substrate docking studies and the mechanism probed by isotope labeling experiments. A variety of α-bromo ketones can be coupled with cyclic and linear dienes. These interesting building blocks can also be further modified to generate difficult-to-access heterocyclic compounds.