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Updated: Dec 25, 2025

Synthesis of Hypervalent Iodonium Alkynyl Triflates for the Application of Generating Cyanocarbenes
Published on: September 8, 2013
Nucleophilic Isocyanation
Taiga Yurino1, Takeshi Ohkuma1
1Division of Applied Chemistry and Frontier Chemistry Center, Faculty of Engineering, Hokkaido University, Kita 13, Nishi 8, Sapporo, Hokkaido 060-8628, Japan.
Abstract:
Isonitriles are frequently employed as both substrates for organic transformations and ligands for organometallic chemistry. However, despite the wide application of the isonitriles, their synthesis generally depends on the traditional dehydration of N-formamide. "Nucleophilic isocyanation" using cyanide as an N-nucleophile is another straightforward strategy affording the corresponding isonitriles. This method has been available since the 19th century but is still an immature procedure and is therefore more rarely used. In this review, we summarize the concepts and recent progress in nucleophilic isocyanation, including the relatively rare examples of catalytic isocyanation.
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