Development and Applications of Hypervalent Iodine Compounds : Powerful Arylation and Oxidation Reagents

The first part of this thesis describes the efficient synthesis of several hypervalent iodine(III) compounds. Electron-rich diaryliodonium salts have been synthesized in a one-pot procedure, employing mCPBA as the oxidant. Both symmetric and unsymmetric diaryliodonium tosylates can be isolated in high yields. An in situ anion exchange also enables the synthesis of previously unobtainable diaryliodonium triflates. A large-scale protocol for the synthesis of a derivative of Koser’s reagent, that is an isolable intermediate in the diaryliodonium tosylate synthesis, is furthermore described. The large-scale synthesis is performed in neat TFE, which can be recovered and recycled. This is very desirable from an environmental point of view. One of the few described syntheses of enantiopure diaryliodonium salts is discussed. Three different enantiopure diaryliodonium salts bearing electron-rich substituents are synthesized in moderate to high yields. The synthesis of these three salts shows the challenge in the preparation of electron-rich substituted unsymmetric salts. The second part of the thesis describes the application of both symmetric and unsymmetric diaryliodonium salts in organic synthesis. A metal-free efficient and fast method for the synthesis of diaryl ethers from diaryliodonium salts has been developed. The substrate scope is wide as both the phenol and the diaryliodonium salt can be varied. Products such as halogenated ethers, ortho-substituted ethers and bulky ethers, that are difficult to obtain with metal-catalyzed procedures, are readily prepared. The mild protocol allows arylation of racemization-prone a-amino acid derivatives without loss of enantiomeric excess. A chemoselectivity investigation was conducted, in which unsymmetric diaryliodonium salts were employed in the arylation of three different nucleophiles in order to understand the different factors that influence which aryl moiety that is transferred to the nucleophile.At the time of the doctoral defense, the following papers were unpublished and had a status as follows: Paper 2: Accepted. Paper 5: Submitted. Paper 6: Manuscript.