Ruthenium(II)-Catalyzed C-H Activation of Imidamides and Divergent Couplings with Diazo Compounds: Substrate-Controlled Synthesis of Indoles and 3H-Indoles.

Indoles are an important structural motif that is commonly found in biologically active molecules. In this work, conditions for divergent couplings between imidamides and acceptor-acceptor diazo compounds were developed that afforded NH indoles and 3H-indoles under ruthenium catalysis. The coupling of α-diazoketoesters afforded NH indoles by cleavage of the C(N2 )-C(acyl) bond whereas α-diazomalonates gave 3H-indoles by C-N bond cleavage. This reaction constitutes the first intermolecular coupling of diazo substrates with arenes by ruthenium-catalyzed C-H activation.