Decarbonylative coupling reaction of aromatic esters

Transition metal-catalyzed cross-coupling reactions are a powerful method to form chemical bonds. Conventionally, haloarenes has been used as the most reliable aryl electrophiles in cross- coupling. Recent studies in the cross-coupling arena have enabled to employ unconventional but ubiquitous aryl electrophiles such as phenol and aniline. With this trend of organic synthesis, cross-coupling reactions using aromatic carboxylic acid derivatives such as esters as aryl electrophiles have gained considerable attention as a de novo and efficient method to construct C-C and C-heteroatom bonds. In order to realize this particular transformation, it is important to develop and design transition metal catalysts, those are active toward the scission of ester C-O bonds and decarbonylation. In this review, we describe the progress of catalytic decarbonylative cross- coupling of aromatic esters including chronological aspects and mechanistic considerations.