Palladium-catalyzed direct heteroarylation of chloropyridines and chloroquinolines

The direct coupling of aryl chlorides with heteroarenes would be a considerable advantage for sustainable development due to their lower cost, lower mass, the wider diversity of available compounds and also because of the formation of only HCl associated to a base as by-product and the reduction of the number of steps to prepare these compounds. We observed that through the use of PdCl(dppb)(C3H5) as a catalyst, a range of heteroaryl derivatives undergoes coupling via C–H bond activation/functionalization reaction with chloropyridines or chloroquinolines in low to high yields. This air-stable catalyst can be used with a wide variety of substrates. The position of the chloro substituent on pyridines has a minor influence on the yields. On the other hand, the nature on the heteroaryl derivative has a large influence. The highest yields were obtained using benzoxazole, thiophene or thiazole derivatives. The coupling of chloropyridines with furans also gave the expected products, but in low to moderate yields.