Sigma-complex formation and oxidative nucleophilic aromatic substitution in 4-nitro-2,1,3-benzoxadiazoles

The feasibility of carrying out nucleophilic displacement of hydrogen from highly electron-deficient heteroaromatics has been addressed through a detailed investigation of the interaction of a series of nitrobenzofuroxans 3a-i and two related heterocycles 5 and 6, with the 2-nitropropenide anion. Although this series corresponds to a large modulation in the electrophilic properties of the six-membered ring, all reactions first lead to the quantitative formation of the sigma-adducts C-3a-i, C-5 and C-6 arising from covalent addition of the nucleophile to the C-7 carbon. With the exception of the 4-aza substituted member C-5, all the adducts have been isolated as pure and very stable alkali salts. Measurements of the oxidation potentials by cyclic voltammetry reveal that the ease of subsequent hydrogen substitution at carbon-7 strongly decreases with increasing electron deficient character of the six-membered ring. The measured E0 values are in the range 0.5-0.6 V (vs. SCE) for the 4-nitro-benzofuroxan and -benzofurazan adducts (C-3e, C-3i) but they go up to 1.20-1.33 V for the 4,6-dinitro- and 4-nitro-6-trifluoromethanesulfonylbenzofuroxan adducts (C-3a,d) in acetonitrile. Consistently with these E0 values, only very powerful oxidants such as the Ce4+/Ce3+ or the MnO4-/Mn2+ couples can successfully oxidize the adducts leading to the expected substitution products in moderate to good yields (35-72%). Interestingly, the rearomatization of the 4-nitro substituted benzofuroxan adducts proceeds with a partial Boulton-Katritzky rearrangement of the resulting products. Another noteworthy result is that the 4-nitrobenzofuroxan and 4-nitrobenzofurazan molecules suffer competitive addition of the (CH3)2C-NO2- anion to the 5- and 7- positions under some experimental conditions. This represents the first well-defined example of isomeric addition of a carbon nucleophile to these heterocycles.