Palladium-catalyzed C-S activation/aryne insertion/coupling sequence: synthesis of functionalized 2-quinolinones.

The insertion of an aryne into a C-S bond can suppress the addition of an S nucleophile to the aryne in the presence of palladium. Catalyzed by Pd(OAc)₂, a wide range of α-carbamoyl ketene dithioacetals readily react with arynes to selectively afford functionalized 2-quinolinones in high yields under neutral reaction conditions by a C-S activation/aryne insertion/intramolecular coupling sequence. The attractive feature of the new strategy also lies in the versatile transformations of the alkythio-substituted quinolinone products.