Palladium catalyzed reactions 2 + 2 paracyclophane

Dibenzo[2.2]paracyclophane-1,9-diene (2), a unique molecule with two parallel sets of mutually orthogonal aromatic rings, was first synthesized in 1985 by Wong et al. [18]. The reported five-step synthesis gave the strained hydrocarbon in only 0.5% yield. Later a more versatile and economic approach to dibenzoannelated [2.2]paracyclophanedienes 11 including the parent compound 2 was developed by de Meijere et al. [19]. The dibromo[2.2]paracyclo-phane-l-ene (6) and the tetrabromo[2.2]paracyclophane-1,9-diene (7) were obtained from commercially available [2.2]paracyclophane (1) in a bromination-dehydrobromination reaction sequence. With compounds 6 and 7 available in large quantities, the palladium catalyzed coupling with alkenes (Heck reaction)... 

Both decks of the [2.2]paracyclophane derivatives 160 and 161 could be transformed into 1,4-distyrylbenzene chromophores via the palladium-catalyzed coupling (Heck reaction) with styrene and substituted styrenes adopting the protocol of Jeffery [106]. The fourfold coupling products 162 and 163 were thus obtained with yields up to 70% [107a]. As four new carbon-carbon bonds are formed in this transformation, each single coupling step must proceed with excellent yield. All these reactions lead stereoselectively to products with (E)-configurated double bonds. 

In essence, these domino-coupling reactions form cyclohexadiene fragments from three two-carbon fragments. The 1 2 coupling of norbomene and iodobenzene discovered by Catellani and Chiusoli can also be adopted to couple norbomene with /3-bro-mostyrene.f hi an attempt to apply this Pd-catalyzed [2+2 + 2] assembly for an alternative and more productive access to Hopf s trifoliaphane, a 1 2 mixture of [2.2]paracyclophan-l-ene and l-bromo[2.2]paracyclophan-l-ene was tfeated with palladium acetate under Jeffery conditions. The main product was the hydrocarbon consisting of three [2.2]paracyclophane units linked by a common bicyclo[3.3.0]octene unit (Scheme Apparently, the key intermediate formed via a palladacycle preferen-... 

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