Copper- or iron-catalyzed arylation of phenols from respectively aryl chlorides and aryl iodides

The utility of diketone-1 was checked, which was first introduced for bimetallic Fe-Cu catalysts, in copper-catalyzed arylation of phenols from aryl chlorides. A systematic study was first undertaken by choosing 3,5-dimethylphenol as a model substrate. The first blank test was undertaken with PhCl and the dieketone-1/[Cu(acac)2] system. The second blank test was performed without copper and showed as expected that the arylation from PhCl did not proceed at all with a catalytic system only based on iron. A protocol permitting the arylation of 3,5-dimethylphenol with chlorobenzene in excellent yield. The system diketone-1//[Cu(acac)2] efficiently promotes cross-coupling reactions between phenols and chlorobenzene or aryl chlorides, which are deactivated by electron-donating substituents. The results indicate that an efficient global method for arylation of phenols from aromatic chlorides can be discovered.