Ambiphilic cross-coupling with aryl-bismuth reagents

Cross-coupling reactions traditionally permit the formation of Ar-Ar bonds between an aryl nucleophile and an aryl electrophile under transition metal catalysis1,2. The high selectivity of the myriad of couplings known to date relies on a tailored combination of nucleophilic and electrophilic coupling partners, enabled by the mechanistic distinction between nucleophiles and electrophiles, which undergo fundamentally different catalytic steps.3 Here, we report ambiphilic aryl-bismuth reagents that can behave as either nucleophiles or electrophiles in transition metal-catalysed cross-couplings, fundamentally breaking from this dichotomy in reactivity. Their ambiphilic reactivity arises from their ability to engage in both oxidative addition and transmetalation processes with transition metal complexes, as demonstrated by stoichiometric and mechanistic studies. By demonstrating that a single aryl reagent can engage in both canonical elementary steps, this work challenges the long-standing assumption that intrinsic bond polarity rigidly dictates mechanistic role in cross-coupling chemistry.