A novel nickel-catalyzed synthesis of thioesters, esters and amides from aryl iodides in the presence of chromium hexacarbonyl

This study describes our findings on a novel and cheap NiCl2 catalytic system under ligand-free conditions for the efficient thiocarbonylation, alkoxycarbonylation and amidocarbonylation reactions of aryl iodides in the presence of Cr(CO)(6) as the solid source of carbon monoxide under air. A variety of aryl iodides tolerated the reaction conditions and structurally different thiols, alcohols and amines were used efficiently. The corresponding thioesters, esters and amides were obtained in good to excellent yield at atmospheric pressure under mild reaction conditions.