Carbanionic Friedel-Crafts equivalents. regioselective directed ortho and remote metalation-C-N cross coupling routes to acridones and dibenzo[b,f]azepinones.

Carbanion-mediated general regioselective routes to acridones 4 (Table 2) and dibenzo[b,f]azepinones 20 (Table 4) are described. Buchwald-Hartwig C-N cross coupling of o-halo benzamides 1 with anilines 2 or 16, followed by simple N-methylation, dependably provides N-methyl diarylamines 3 (Table 1) and 18 (Table 3). Upon treatment with LDA, 3 and 18 are converted into acridones 4 and dibenzo[b,f]azepinones 20, respectively, in good to excellent yields with regioselectivity which depends upon the presence or absence of directed metalation groups (DMGs). Brief investigations as follows are described: the synthesis of desmethyl acridone 15 (Scheme 4), an attempt to effect a double-directed remote metalation sequence which leads only to a monocyclization product 13 (Scheme 3), and an analogous but nonregioselective route to a xanthone 22 and dibenzo[b,f]oxepinone 24 (Scheme 5). DFT calculations reveal low energy conformations for compounds 18b and 23 which account for product formation and indicate that the cyclization reactions are under kinetic control.