Nickel-Catalyzed Electrochemical Reductive Homocouplings of Aryl and Heteroaryl Halides: A Useful Route to Symmetrical Biaryls

Due to their widespread presence in functional materials and pharmaceuticals, biaryls are of fundamental importance in organic chemistry. Methods for the synthesis of symmetrical biaryls generally involve both metallic reduction and transition-metal catalysis. In this work, we show that electroreduction can also constitute a very relevant way to achieve the nickel-catalyzed reductive synthesis of symmetrical biaryl compounds. Therefore, it is demonstrated that both aryl and heteroaryl halides undergo reductive coupling to furnish the corresponding symmetrical biaryls in fair to excellent yields. Reactions are performed under very mild conditions thus ensuring important functional group tolerance.