Oxidative addition of an alkyl halide to form a stable Cu(III) product

Authors: Yongrui Luo, Yuli Li, Jian Wu, Xiao-Song Xue, John F. Hartwig, Qilong Shen

Published: 2023-09-07

DOI: 10.1126/science.adg9232

Source: Full article


Abstract

The step that cleaves the carbon-halogen bond in copper-catalyzed cross-coupling reactions remains ill defined because of the multiple redox manifolds available to copper and the instability of the high-valent copper product formed. We report the oxidative addition of α-haloacetonitrile to ionic and neutral copper(I) complexes to form previously elusive but here fully characterized copper(III) complexes. The stability of these complexes stems from the strong Cu−CF