The Dynamic Lewis Acid–Carbene Hybrid: Pushing the Electrophilicity of Carbenes to the Limit
Runbo Pei, Liancheng He, Yue Zhao, Xinping Wang
Abstract
This work describes a Lewis-acid-coordination strategy to efficiently enhance the electrophilicity of a carbene beyond structural modification. A hybrid BCF–DAC is formed by the coordination of a Lewis acid, B(C 6 F 5 ) 3 (BCF), to an N, N ′-diamidocarbene (DAC), possessing superior low LUMO energy that is indicated by theoretical calculation. This endows the hybridized carbene with a unique reactivity that speeds up the activation of the sp 3 -hybridized C–H bond of toluene and the [2+1] cycloaddition with C 2 H 2 . More strikingly, the hybrid readily undergoes [2+1] cycloaddition with C 2 H 4 under ambient conditions, which is the first example of a stable carbene reacting with ethylene. The Lewis acid approach also features dynamic behavior and electrophilicity tunability.