Nucleophilic coupling arynes

Arynic substitution is a versatile technique of functional group transformation in aromatic systems and has found varied applications in preparation of simple compounds and in multi-step synthesis.3 4,3 The present section comprises examples illustrative of its synthetic scope. Attention is also drawn to some allied strategies which, when used in conjunction with the nucleophilic coupling of arynes, have opened convenient routes to complex natural products. 

A variety of substituted aromatic compounds have been prepared through addition of anionic nucleophiles to arynes generated from readily accessible precursors.1 Most of the laboratory preparations start with aryl halides. The coupling yields are usually good to modest (equations 13-15) but can be poor (equation 16).83 Sometimes, a dramatic improvement in reaction efficiency can be achieved by the change of the base/solvent pair or other reaction conditions. For instance, in arylation of phenoxides and benzenethiolates, a switch over to DMSO as the solvent boosted the yield considerably (equation 17).86 Another example, illustrative of this point, is the reaction of N-methylpyrrolidone with aryl halides where an acceptable yield could not be obtained under a variety of conditions except with LICA in THF (equation 18).71... 

Methyl thiosalicylate provides both electrophilic and nucleophilic sites for annulation of arynes generated from silylaryl triflates in the presence of CsF. An initial intermolecular nucleophilic coupling to afford a diaryl sulfide 529 is followed by an intramolecular electrophilic cyclization and thioxanthones result. The use of THF as solvent suppresses the competitive proton abstraction which leads to methyl 2-thiophenoxybenzoate (Scheme 211) <2005OL4273>. 

Another important aspect of aryne chemistry that has found application in benzo-fused heterocycles synthesis is MCRs, which generally include the first addition of nucleophiles to arynes and subsequent interception of the aryl anion intermediate with other electrophiles. If the nucleophile and electrophile are not part of the same molecule, the overall process is a unique multicomponent coupling, where the aryne is inserted between the other two coupling partners to afford the final product 85 (Scheme 39). This highly efficient transition-metal-free methodology has been applied to the S5mthesis of valuable benzo-fused heterocycles and has foxmd application in natural product synthesis. 

Just as in phenyl halides, the halogen can be replaced by hydrogen, by a metal, or be coupled. Two of the four mechanisms of such nucleophilic substitutions are also familiar from benzene chemistry via arynes and by the SRN1 mechanism. However, of the two further mechanisms of nucleophilic replacement, the ANRORC is unique to heterocycles, and SAE reactions occur only with strongly activated benzenoid systems. 

Both xanthones and thioxanthones are available through CsF-promoted coupling of arynes with salicylates and thiosalicylates. The synthesis proceeds through sequential intermolecular nucleophilic substitution and intramolecular electrophilic cyclisation (Scheme 39) <07JOC583>. The Pd-catalysed annulation of 3-iodoflavone with the same triflate results in the dibenzo[a,c]xanthone (Scheme 39) <07JOC223>. 

In spite of their high total energy, arynes in general are selective towards different nucleophiles thus benzyne selectively captures the anion of acetonitrile in the presence of an excess of the dimethylamide ion used to generate both it and the benzyne. Nucleophilicity towards benzyne, determined by competition experiments, is in the order RLi RS- > R2N RO and I- > Br > Cl, which is an order of softness. The low energy of the LUMO of benzyne, coupled with its being uncharged, makes it a soft electrophile. 

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