Free Radical Pathway Cleavage of C—O Bonds for the Synthesis of Alkylboron Compounds

Abstract

We report a silver-catalyzed borylation of alkyl tosylates, which provides a new method for the synthesis of alkylboron compounds with good functional group compatibility and excellent chemoselectivity. The present work added highly polarized alkyl tosylate C—O bonds to the fairly limited number of C—O bonds able to participate in free radical cleavage pathways. The mechanistic studies suggested that in situ-generated silver(0) catalytic species were the active catalytic species and played a key role in the radical pathway cleavage of C—O bonds.