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Alkynes have found widespread applications in synthetic chemistry, biology, and materials sciences. In recent years, methods based on electrophilic alkynylation with hypervalent iodine reagents have made acetylene synthesis more flexible and efficient, but they lead to the formation of one equivalent of an iodoarene as side-product. Herein, a more efficient strategy involving a copper-catalyzed oxy-alkynylation of diazo compounds with ethynylbenziodoxol(on)e (EBX) reagents is described, which proceeds with generation of nitrogen gas as the only waste. This reaction is remarkable for its broad scope in both EBX reagents and diazo compounds. In addition, vinyl diazo compounds gave enynes selectively as single geometric isomers. The functional groups introduced during the transformation served as easy handles to access useful building blocks for synthetic and medicinal chemistry.
Alkynes are found in a multitude of natural or synthetic bioactive compounds. In addition to the capacity of these chemical motifs to impact the physicochemical properties of a molecule of interest, the well-established reactivity of alkynes makes them ...
Jérôme Waser, Eliott Hugo Joran Le Du