Investigation of the reductive cleavage of BINAP and application to the rapid synthesis of phospholes.

A rapid and easy entry into λ(3)-phospholes and λ(4)-phosphole oxides derived from BINAP is reported herein featuring a variety of C and Si substituents and functional groups, as well the investigative work on the mechanistic pathway. DFT calculations using B3LYP functionals have been carried out to rationalize the mechanism. The observed experimental (31)P resonance shifts were compared with the calculated shifts of the proposed intermediates after calibration of the shielding tensors. The calculations included the use of polarizable continuum models to take into account solvent effects and were found to be in excellent agreement, providing further evidence for the proposed mechanism.