Highly efficient palladium-catalyzed Suzuki–Miyaura reactions of potassium aryltrifluoroborates with 5-iodo-1,3-dioxin-4-ones in water: an approach to α-aryl-β-ketoesters

The high efficient palladium-catalyzed Suzuki–Miyaura reactions of potassium aryltrifluoroborates 3 with 5-iodo-1,3-dioxin-4-ones 2a–b in water as only solvent in the presence of n-Bu4NOH as base is reported. The respective 5-aryl-1,3-dioxin-4-ones 4a–n were obtained in good to excellent yields. The catalyst system provides high efficiency at low load using electronically diverse coupling partners. The obtained 2,2,6-trimethyl-5-aryl-1,3-dioxin-4-ones were transformed into corresponding α-aryl-β-ketoesters 6 by reaction with an alcohol in the absence of solvent.