The addition of lithium dienolate 130, formed from ethyl 2-bromocrotonate, to enones and aldehydes yielding vinylcyclopropanes and vinyloxiranes was optimized. Various methods, pyrolytic and nonpyrolytic, were examined for the rearrangement of the resulting vinylcyclopropanes to cyclopentenes in an overall [2+3] annulation sequence. During the course of these studies, a new rearrangement pathway of these vinylcyclopropanes to bridged [3.2.n] bicyclic systems was discovered thus establishing a new [3+4] annulation technology. The extension of the [2+3] annulation technology to oxygenated cyclopentanoids was addressed. Several ethyl 2-bromo-4-oxycrotonates were synthesized, and the reaction of their lithium dienolates (217) with enones was investigated. The rearrangement of the resulting enol ether terminated vinylcyclopropanes to oxygenated cyclopentenes was also examined. [see document for diagram of chemical reaction] The application of this methodology was expressed in a synthetic approach to (-)-specionin (109). The key steps in this synthesis involved the cyclopropanation of optically pure enone 147 with Iithium dienolate 155 to give vinylcyclopropanes 169-exo/endo and the rearrangement of 169 to the oxygenated cyclopentanoid 187-exo which possesses the correct stereochemistry for further elaboration to epoxy acetate 216, an intermediate in a reported synthesis of specionin. [see document for diagrams of chemical reactions] / Ph. D.