Multimodal Carbon Monoxide Photorelease from Flavonoids

Photooxygenation of flavonoids leads to the release of carbon monoxide (CO). Our structure-photoreactivity study, employing several structurally different flavonoids, including their ¹³C-labeled analogs, revealed that CO can be produced via two completely orthogonal pathways, depending on their hydroxy group substitution pattern and the reaction conditions. While photooxygenation of the enol 3-OH group has previously been established as the CO liberation channel, we show that the catechol-type hydroxy groups of ring B can predominantly participate in photodecarbonylation.