Biphenyls methoxy-substituted, oxidation

In a recent paper, the same authors showed that iron(III) chloride can mediate the oxidative coupling of substituted aryl ethers with an observed regioselectivity that depends on the substitution pattern [66] meta-substituted phenol ethers 77 led to polymers (Scheme 18a) whereas para-substituted phenol ether 79 gave predominantly biphenyl structures (Scheme 18b). ortho-Substituted phenol ether 81 provided a dimer with the Ar-Ar bond at a position para to one of the methoxy substituents (Scheme 18c). 

The simpler architecture is the 1,1 -biphenyl scaffold, likewise introduced by Hoveyda and coworkers [19]. The synthesis of the imidazolium salt starts with a chiral diamine and a substituted, achiral biphenyl [82-84], Subsequent introduction of a Mes substituent on the remaining primary amino end and ring closure reaction yields the chiral saturated imidazolium salt after hydrolysation of the methoxy group to liberate the phenolic hydroxy group (see Figure 4.22). Reaction with silver(I) oxide and carbene transfer to a Grubbs (Hoveyda) catalyst sets up the ruthenium catalyst complex. 

Figure 10 Theoretical (a) and practical (b) representation of QSARs. Panel b describes a QSAR for the methanotrophic oxidation (activity of methane monooxygenase) of 6>r /i6>(Ci2)-substituted biphenyls. The structural backbone was biphenyl, and the substituents considered included all halogens, methyl-, methoxy-, hydroxyl-, nitro-, and amino-moieties (Lindner et al, 2003). The molecular descriptors used in (b) are (charge on the ortho-csubon), (Taft s steric parameter), and log ow...

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