Intermolecular coupling is one of the important synthetic strategies for forming new bonds in organic chemistry, medicinal chemistry, and biochemistry. Over the past several decades, transition metal-based catalysts such as Pd, Ni, and Cu have been employed to form a new bond in most organic syntheses. However, it has a crucial disadvantage in terms of environmental aspects that metal-catalyzed coupling reactions were performed under high-temperature conditions and toxic organic solvent. To solve these critical drawbacks, alternative synthetic strategies for intermolecular coupling have been diversely proposed. Although a lot of new ways proposed, the photocatalysis technique, which uses only catalysts and light, can be a reasonably unique approach because it is able to react under mild reaction conditions (temperature and time) and use less toxic chemicals. Owing to the high light-absorbing efficacy in the visible light region and great catalytic activity at the nanoscale regime, the use of plasmonic Au nanocatalysts could be a delightful strategy for the intermolecular carbon-carbon coupling reaction. In this study, we have employed singular Au nanoparticles as a photocatalyst to drive the organic reaction and the Suzuki coupling, which is the most well-established intermolecular carbon-carbon bond formation, was used as a model system. We successfully synthesized biphenyl from the aryl halide and phenylboronic acid combination through Au-catalyzed intermolecular coupling. Also, we obtained benzene and phenol as minor products. And we carried out the DFT calculation to understand the mechanistic insight of Au-catalyzed intermolecular coupling. Based on the experimental facts and calculations, we figured out that the “Homo-coupling” is a more favorable pathway to form intermolecular carbon-carbon bond formation rather than the “Cross-Coupling”.

Intermolecular coupling via coupling of Au nanoparticles and visible light

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