Palladium-Catalyzed Aryldifluoromethylation of Aryl Halides with Aryldifluoromethyl Trimethylsilanes.

Diaryl difluoromethanes are valuable targets for medicinal chemistry because they are bioisosteres of diaryl ethers and can function as replacements for diaryl methane, ketone, and sulfone groups. However, methods to prepare diaryl difluoromethanes are scarce, especially methods starting from abundant aryl halides. We report the Pd-catalyzed aryldifluoromethylation of aryl halides with aryldifluoromethyl trimethylsilanes (TMSCF2 Ar). The reaction occurs when the catalyst contains a simple, but unusual, dialkylaryl phosphine ligand that promotes transmetallation of the silane. Computational studies show that reductive elimination following transmetallation occurs with a low barrier, despite the fluorine atoms on the α-carbon, due to coordination of the difluorobenzyl π-system to palladium. The co-development of a cobalt-catalyzed synthesis of the silanes broadened the scope of the process including several applications to the synthesis biologically relevant diaryl difluoromethanes.

Direct Observation of Diastereomeric α-C-Bound Enolates during Enantioselective α-Arylations: Synthesis, Characterization, and Reactivity of Arylpalladium Fluorooxindole Complexes.

The Pd-catalyzed asymmetric α-arylation of carbonyl compounds is a valuable strategy to form benzylic stereocenters. However, the origin of the stereoselectivity of these reactions is poorly understood, and little is known about the reactivity of the putative diastereomeric arylpalladium enolate intermediates. To this end, we report the synthesis and characterization of a series of diphosphine-ligated arylpalladium fluoroenolate complexes, including complexes bearing a metal-bound, stereogenic carbon and an enantioenriched chiral diphosphine ligand. These complexes reductively eliminate to form chiral α-aryl-α-fluorooxindoles with enantioselectivities and rates that are relevant to those of the catalytic process with SEGPHOS as the ancillary ligand. Kinetic studies showed that the rate of reductive elimination is slightly slower than the rate of epimerization of the intermediate, causing the reductive elimination step to impart the greatest influence on the enantioselectivity. DFT calculations of these processes are consistent with these experimental rates and suggest that the minor diastereomer forms the major enantiomer of the product. The rates of reductive elimination from complexes containing a variety of electronically varied aryl ligands revealed the unusual trend that complexes bearing more electron-rich aryl ligands react faster than those bearing more electron-poor aryl ligands. Noncovalent Interaction (NCI) and Natural Bond Orbital (NBO) analyses of the transition-state structures for reductive elimination from the SEGPHOS-ligated complexes revealed key donor-acceptor interactions between the Pd center and the fluoroenolate fragment. These interactions stabilize the pathway to the major product enantiomer more strongly than they stabilize that to the minor enantiomer.

Unusual Electronic Effects of Ancillary Ligands on the Perfluoroalkylation of Aryl Iodides and Bromides Mediated by Copper(I) Pentafluoroethyl Complexes of Substituted Bipyridines.

Several perfluoroalkylcopper compounds have been reported previously that serve as reagents or catalysts for the perfluoroalkylation of aryl halides. However, the relationships between the reactivity of such complexes and the electronic properties of the ancillary ligands are unknown, and such relationships are not well-known in general for copper complexes that mediate or catalyze cross coupling. We report the synthesis and characterization of a series of pentafluoroethylcopper(I) complexes ligated by bipyridine ligands possessing varied electronic properties. In contrast to the limited existing data on the reactivity of L2Cu(I)-X complexes bearing amine and pyridine-type ligands in Ullmann-type aminations with aryl halides, the reactions of aryl halides with pentafluoroethylcopper(I) complexes bearing systematically varied bipyridine ligands were faster for complexes bearing less electron-donating bipyridines than for complexes bearing more electron-donating bipyridines. Analysis of the rates of reaction and the relative populations of the neutral complexes [(R2bpy)CuC2F5] and ionic complexes [(R2bpy)2Cu][Cu(C2F5)2] formed by these reagents in solution suggests that this effect of electronics on the reaction rate results from an unusual trend of faster oxidative addition of aryl halides to [(R2bpy)CuC2F5] complexes containing less electron-donating R2bpy ligands than to those containing more electron-donating R2bpy ligands.

Copper-Mediated C-N Coupling of Arylsilanes with Nitrogen Nucleophiles.

A method for the oxidative coupling of arylsilanes with nitrogen nucleophiles is reported. This method occurs with a broad range of heptamethyltrisiloxylarenes and nitrogen nucleophiles, proceeds with the arylsilane as limiting reagent, and does not require a fluoride activator with electron-poor arylsilanes. The combination of this method with C-H silylation generates arylamines from unactivated arenes with site selectivity controlled by steric effects. This combination of steps gives direct access to many compounds that cannot be accessed via alternative C-H functionalization methods, including direct C-H amination or the combination of C-H borylation and amination.