Synthesis of carbazoles and dibenzofurans via cross-coupling of o-iodoanilines and o-iodophenols with silylaryl triflates.

[reaction: see text] An efficient route to synthesize a variety of carbazoles and dibenzofurans has been developed. It involves the reaction of o-iodoanilines or o-iodophenols with silylaryl triflates in the presence of CsF to afford the N- or O-arylated products, which are subsequently cyclized using a Pd catalyst to carbazoles and dibenzofurans in good to excellent yields. This chemistry tolerates a variety of functional groups.