CO Surrogates: A Green Alternative in Palladium-Catalyzed CO Gas Free Carbonylation Reactions

Carbonylation reactions with carbon monoxide (CO) provide efficient and attractive routes for the synthesis of bulk and fine chemicals. However, the practice of using a large excess of an inflammable, lethal and greenhouse CO gas is always a concern in this chemistry. The development of CO surrogates has gained substantial interest and become a green alternative to gaseous CO. Many of the recent studies have focused on the development of other benign and safe reagents to work as a CO source in carbonylation reactions, and the assortment of feasible CO surrogates for specific reaction can be accomplished by the literature data. This review describes the recent developments in palladium-catalyzed carbonyl insertions without the direct use of gaseous CO.