Synthetic and Predictive Approach to Unsymmetrical Biphenols by Iron-Catalyzed Chelated Radical-Anion Oxidative Coupling

An iron-catalyzed oxidative unsymmetrical biphenol coupling in 1,1,1,3,3,3-hexafluoropropan-2-ol that proceeds via a chelated radical anion coupling mechanism was developed. Based on mechanistic studies, electrochemical methods, and density functional theory calculations, we suggest a general model that enables prediction of the feasibility of cross-coupling for a given pair of phenols.