The oxidative dimerizationo f2 -phenylpyridine derivatives using cobalt catalysis is reported. Three types of reaction conditions were developed with different loadings of cobalt catalyst. Cross couplingo ft wo different 2arylpyridines using cobalt catalysis proceeded with modest yields and selectivity.The biaryl moiety is one of the most important privileged structures in medicinal chemistry and is prevalent in al arge number of pharmaceuticals and biologically active molecules. [1] Many methods have been developedt op repare aryl-aryl or aryl-heteroaryl compounds. In this transformation, at ransitionmetal catalyzedc ross-coupling reactiono ft wo prefunctionalized materials has been well documented. [1] The low valent cobalt complexes, usually in situ generated, exhibit high reactivity and selectivity in the cross-coupling reaction. [2] Recently, transition-metal-catalyzed homocoupling of CÀH/CÀHb onds has been developeda sa ne fficient and straightforward strategy for constructing biaryl skeletons. [3] This approach does not requirep refunctionalized startingm aterials, which reduces the synthetic steps and amount of byproducts. 2-Arylpyridines, phenylacetamides, anda ryloxazolines were proven to be effective substrates to undergo the oxidative homocoupling reaction for construction of the biaryl compounds using Pd, [4] Ru, [5] and Ni [6] catalysis. Yu and co-workersreported Cu II -mediated dimerization of 2-arylpyridines. [7] The research group of Daugulis described the Co III -promoted dimerization of aminoquinoline benzamides. [8] However,i nt heset wo cases, either Cu or Co salt was stoichiometrically required. Herein, we report the oxidative homocoupling of 2-phenylpyridinesw ith am ore abundant and cheaper cobalt catalyst using PhI(OAc) 2 and O 2 as cooxidants.During our recent studies on cobalt-mediated ortho-CÀH functionalization of carboxamide 1,w eo bserved the formation of dimerization product 2 and isolated two types of cobaltamide complexes 3 and 4 [9] [Eq. (1)].X -ray single-crystald iffraction established the structurest ob eb iaryl-linked diamide compounds complexed with Co III metal anda na cetylacetone anion as the ligand. The difference between co-amide complexes 3 and 4 is the different orientation of the acetylacetone anion group that is attached to the cobalt metal. Prior to our optimization of the reaction conditions for this reaction, the research group of Daugulis [8] publishedt heir study on the same reaction. Therefore, we focused our attention on the dimerization of other types of substrates using cobalt catalysis. As 2phenylpyridines werew ell used as substrates in the cobalt-catalyzed coupling reaction, [10] we envisionedt hat 2-phenylpyridines could undergo an oxidativeh omocoupling reaction via cobalt catalysis under the appropriate conditions.The investigation of the oxidative homocoupling reaction employed 2-phenylpyridine 5a as the substrate. The initial reactions conditions included Co(OAc) 2 ·4 H 2 O( 10 mol %) and PhI(OAc) 2 (2 equiv) as an oxidanti nA cOH under reflux, ...