Efficient and selective alkylation of arenes and heteroarenes with benzyl and allyl ethers using a Ir/Sn bimetallic catalyst

Access to Substituted 1,1-Diarylalkanes by Friedel-Crafts Benzylations Mediated by FeCl3-based Deep Eutectic Solvents

The development of new, more efficient Friedel-Crafts benzylation methodologies that provide access to 1,1-diarylalkanes is an important objective of interest for the production of pharmaceuticals and fine chemical products. In this regard, this study introduces a novel synthetic route to 1,1-diarylalkanes conducted in the Deep Eutectic Solvent (DES) 3 FeCl3 ⋅ 6 H2O/Gly, which serves as both a reaction medium and promoter. Under these conditions, Friedel-Crafts benzylations of various arenes bearing activating and deactivating ortho-/para-directing groups, can be performed using diverse benzylating reagents such as styrenes, alcohols, acetates, ethers, and chlorides. Importantly, highly electronically deactivated electrophiles, including those with CF3 and NO2 groups, are suitable substrates. This methodology provides a wide range of asymmetric 1,1-diarylalkanes (up to 132 examples) with generally good yields and high regioselectivities. The efficiency of this approach was demonstrated with the multigram-scale synthesis (10 mmol) of 1-phenyl-1-xylyl ethane (PXE), a liquid with great industrial applicability. Moreover, the Fe(III)-based DES could be reused for 20 consecutive cycles with no appreciable erosion of the yields.

Supramolecular catalysis with ethers enabled by dual chalcogen bonding activation

The activation of ethers by weak interactions is a long-standing objective in supramolecular catalysis, but yet it remains an underdeveloped topic. The obstacles towards solving this problem are prominent since it is difficult for a weak interaction to cleave a relatively strong C-O σ-bond and moreover, the ionic intermediate composing of an alkoxide ion and an electrophilic carbocation would deactivate weak interaction donors. Herein, we describe a distinctive activation mode, dual Se···π and Se···O bonding, that could activate benzylic as well as allylic ether C-O σ-bonds to achieve cyclization, coupling and elimination reactions. This dual Se···π and Se···O bonding catalysis approach could tolerate various alkoxide leaving groups, while the other representative weak interaction donors showed no catalytic activity.

Radical-Friedel-Crafts benzylation of arenes with benzyl ethers over 2H-MoS2: ether cleavage into carbon- and oxygen-centered radicals

The selective activation of C-O ether bonds is an essential tool in organic synthesis and natural polymer depolymerization. However, the direct cleavage of the ether bond is still challenging work, especially breaking this inert and redox-neutral bond to provide one active carbon radical and another oxygen-centered fragment with oxidation capacity that can participate in the controllable radical reaction. We herein report that commercial 2H-MoS₂ with negligible acidity can efficiently catalyze the benzylation of arenes with benzyl ethers, and a new Radical-Friedel-Crafts mechanism is proposed, which is quite different from the strong acid-catalyzed Friedel-Crafts mechanism. With dibenzyl ether as the model benzylation reagent, 2H-MoS₂ can achieve the homolytic cleavage of the Bn-OR bond to generate the benzyl carbon radical and RO˙ species, identified by EPR measurement and radical trap experiments. The following radical-involved benzylation is confirmed by the Hammett results and a plausible pathway is proposed to clarify the Radical-Friedel-Crafts process. Heterogeneous 2H-MoS₂ can be consecutively used four times without regeneration and it offers 94-95% yields of 2-benzyl-1,4-dimethylbenzene from dibenzyl ether and p-xylene in 30 min at 140 °C. Furthermore, this mechanism can provide some inspiration to activate the ether bond and to utilize ether as an oxidant in C-H bond activation.

Recent advances in heterobimetallic catalysis across a “transition metal–tin” motif

This review focuses on the efficacy of catalysts, based on a transition metal–tin (TM–Sn) motif and crafted on a single scaffold, in mediating a wide variety of organic transformations.

Nucleophilicity and site selectivity of commonly used arenes and heteroarenes

By using the inverse concept of electrophilicity and nucleophilicity and with four different available equations from literature for electrophilicity and electrodonating power, the nucleophilicity values of 69 commonly used arenes and heteroarenes have been calculated at the B3LYP/6-311+G(d,p) level of theory. The linearity between the nucleophilicity and Hammett sigma and sigma(p) values has been chosen as a test to judge the goodness of the methods used. Finally four different arene and heteroarene series (substituted indoles, phenols, pyrroles, and anisoles) have been subjected to local nucleophilicity analysis in order to predict the site selectivity in electrophilic aromatic substitution reactions (EAS). In each case we have obtained excellent correlation with the experimental result.

Versatile Friedel-Crafts-type alkylation of benzene derivatives using a molybdenum complex/ortho-chloranil catalytic system

A variety of molybdenum complexes catalyze Friedel-Crafts-type alkylation reactions of benzene derivatives with alkenes and alcohols in the presence of an organic oxidant, o-chloranil. The utilization of [Mo(CO)(6)] and two equivalents of o-chloranil catalytically furnished the hydroarylation product of norbornene with p-xylene at 80 degrees C, whereas [Cr(CO)(6)] and [W(CO)(6)] failed to catalyze the same reaction, thus indicating the importance of the molybdenum source. The best results were obtained when a molybdenum(II) complex [CpMoCl(CO)(3)] (Cp=cyclopentadienyl) was used as a precatalyst. The hydroarylation reactions also took place with styrenes, cyclohexenes, and 1-hexene as olefin substrates. The electrophilic-substitution mechanism was proposed on the basis of the ortho/para selectivities and the Markovnikov selectivities observed for the hydroarylation products. Our hypothesis was further corroborated by the fact that in the presence of the [CpMoCl(CO)(3)]/o-chloranil catalytic system, secondary, benzylic, or allylic alcohols participated in the alkylation of benzenes with similar selectivities.