Iodonium Salts : Preparation, Chemoselectivity and Metal-Catalyzed Applications

Abstract: This thesis concerns the preparation and use of diaryliodonium salts. In Project I various unsymmetrical diaryliodonium salts were reacted with three different nucleophiles in order to study the chemoselectivity of the reactions of the salts. The main focus of this project was to gain a deeper understanding of the underlying factors that affect the chemoselectivity in transition metal-free arylation reactions. They were found to be very nucleophile-dependent. Some nucleophiles were very sensitive to electronic effects, whereas others were sensitive to steric factors. Ultimately, some arenes are never transferred. A very interesting scrambling reaction was also observed under the reaction conditions, where unsymmetrical diaryliodonium salts form symmetrical salts in situ.Project II details the preparation of N-heteroaryliodonium salts via a one-pot procedure. The salts were designed so that the N-heteroaryl moiety was selectively transferred in applications both with and without transition metals. The chemoselectivity was demonstrated by selective transfer of the pyridyl group onto two different nucleophiles.The third project in the thesis discusses the synthesis of alkynyl(aryl)iodonium salts and alkynylbenziodoxolones from arylsilanes. This protocol could potentially be a very useful complement to the existing procedures, in which boronic acids are used.The last part of the thesis (Project IV) describes a C-2 selective arylation of indoles where diaryliodonium salts were used in combination with hetero-geneous palladium catalysis. This transformation was performed in water at ambient temperature to 50 °C, and tolerated variations of both the indole and the diaryliodonium salt. Importantly, several N-H indoles could be arylated. The MCF-supported Pd-catalyst showed very little leaching and it was demonstrated that the main part of the reaction occurred via heterogeneous catalysis.