Recently, the chemistry of the selenopyrylium [2][3][4] and telluropyrylium salts, [2][3][4][5] six-membered cationic heteroaromatics containing a selenium or tellurium atom, in both fields of organic synthesis and the chemical transformation of organotellurium and organoselenium compounds, has attracted considerable attention. Both of the monocyclic pyrylium 6,7) and 1-benzopyrylium salts [8][9][10] containing these atoms have been prepared, and the chemistry of these compounds has been reviewed. We have also previously reported the practical and facile preparation [11][12][13] and the reactions 11,14,15) of these 1-benzopyrylium salts. More recently, we succeeded in preparing 16) the stable 2-benzotelluropyrylium 17) and 2-benzoselenopyrylium salts, 18) structural isomers of them; the former is a previously unknown heterocyclic ring system. Therefore, this paper deals with the results of the examination of the reactivity of these novel 2-benzopyryliun salts with various nucleophiles using the stable compounds, 3-tert-butyl and (or) 3-unsubstituted derivatives as easily available pyrylium salts. The differences in the reactivity of these pyrylium salts containing a tellurium or selenium atom have received most of our attention thus far.
Results and DiscussionReduction of Pyrylium Salts 23) were reported. In all cases, the major products are 4H-pyrans. The one-electron reduction of them when treated with zinc dust [24][25][26] in a degassed aprotic solvent gives the bichalcogenopyran derivatives via the pyranyl radical intermediates. We have previously described that the LiAlH 4 reduction of the 1-benzotelluropyrylium salts 11) and 1-benzoselenopyrylium salts, 14) the regioisomers of the title compounds, afforded a mixture of the corresponding 2H-and 4H-chromenes, respectively; the latter was the major product. In order to compare these behaviors, we first examined the hydride reduction of the 2-benzopyrylium salts (1). The reduction of 1A and 1B with LiAlH 4 in diethyl ether at 0°C afforded the 1H-isoselenochromenes (2A) and 1H-isotellurochoromenes (2B) in moderate yields as the sole products, respectively. The use of THF as a solvent almost gave similar results. The pyrylium salts (1) were also reduced by DIBAL-H to give the 1H-isochromenes (2) in quantitative yields. These compounds (2) were identical with the authentic samples, 16) which were the precursors for the synthesis of the corresponding pyrylium salts (1A) and (1B). The 3-tertbutyl-2-benzopyrylium salts (1Aa) and (1Ba) reacted with excess zinc dust in acetonitrile at 0°C under an argon atmosphere to give 1,1Ј-bis(tert-butylisochromenyl) (3Aa) and (3Ba) in 18 and 15% yield as the sole characterized products, respectively. The MS spectrum of compound 3Aa suggested the diselenide molecular formula of C 26 H 30 Se 2 as it measured a molecular ion at m/zϭ502 ( 80 Se) and the expected isotope pattern for Se 2 . The base peak was m/zϭ251, which was a half of the molecular ion. In addition the HR-MS of 3Aa showed the exact molecular formula. There was no c...