Synergistic asymmetric diarylation of tethered alkenes via C–H functionalization of simple (hetero)arenes

By virtue of the atom- and step-economy, utilization of simple arenes as a supplant of pre-prepared aryl metal species or aryl halides for the synthesis of arylated chiral molecules has attracted great attention from the synthetic community. While transition-metal-catalyzed enantioselective diarylation of tethered alkenes has been employed to prepare important chiral cyclic compounds, the direct use of simple arenes as aryl precursors is still underdeveloped, probably due to the difficulties in the effective control of the reactivity, site-selectivity and/or enantioselectivity. Herein we report an asymmetric Pd/Ag dual metal catalytic system for the non-directed, site- and enantioselective domino Heck/intermolecular C–H functionalization of arenes. Mechanistic studies showed that Pd and Ag act in cooperation in the catalysis and the chiral bisphosphine ligand plays a bifunctional role, i.e., assisting the silver species in the cleavage of the aryl C–H bond, while inducing the enantioselectivity on direct complexation with palladium. This method provides an efficient approach to the corresponding chiral oxindoles with good enantiomeric excesses from a broad scope of arenes, including fluoroarenes, heteroarenes and several complex products derived from medicines or natural products.