Aromatic compounds ring expansion with carbenes

The highly reactive species methylene inserts into C—H bonds,both aliphatic and aromatic,though with aromatic compounds ring expansion is also possible (see 15-62). This version of the reaction is useless for synthetic purposes because of its nonselectivity (see p. 248). This contrasts with the metal carbene insertion reaction, which can be highly selective, and is very useful in synthesis. Alkylcarbenes usually rearrange rather than give insertion (p. 249), but, when this is impossible. 

D.ii. Addition to Aromatic Derivatives. Aromatic compounds also react with carbenes, but ring expansion usually follows the initial cyclopropanation. In a typical example, 2-methoxynaphthalene (373) reacted with dichlorocarbene to give 374, and subsequent ring expansion gave 375, 99 which is a general reaction of enol ethers, which give either unsaturated acetals or unsaturated carbonyls. oo... 

Addition of carbenes to Jt-electron excessive aromatic compounds, or those which possess a high degree of bond fixation, is well established. Dihalocarbenes react with naphthalenes with ring expansion to produce benztropylium systems (Scheme 7.8). Loss of hydrogen halide from the initially formed product leads to an alkene which reacts with a second equivalent of the carbene to yield the spirocyclopropyl derivatives in high yield (>95%) [14, 50]. Insertion into the alkyl side chain (see Section 7.2) also occurs, but to a lesser extent [14]. Not unexpectedly, dichlorocarbene adds to phenanthrenes across the 9,10-bond [9, 10, 14], but it is remarkable that the three possible isomeric spiro compounds could be isolated (in an overall yield of 0.05% ) from the corresponding reaction with toluene [14]. 

Ring expansion of aromatic compounds by carbene, carbethoxycarbene, chlorocarbene, and carbenoid is well known 256, 336, 351-356). Muller and co-workers reported the reaction of aromatic compounds with carbene generated from a catalytic decomposition of diazomethane with copper salts, and proposed a bimolecular two-step mechanism involving an inverse ylid for the reaction. Miller (336) proposed another bimolecular two-step mechanism for the reaction of benzene with alkylcarbenoids of aluminum. Baldwin and Smith (25) proposed a concerted mechanism for the reaction of aromatic compounds with carbethoxycarbene. Reaction of alkylbenzene with diethylzinc and ethylidene iodide gives 7-methylcyclohepta-l,3,5-triene derivatives in yield 369). The... 

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