A modular synthesis of sulfondiimidoyl fluorides-the double aza-analogues of sulfonyl fluorides-allowing variation of the carbon and both nitrogen-substituents is reported. The chemistry uses readily available organometallic reagents, commercial sulfinylamines, simple electrophiles, and N-fluorobenzenesulfonimide (NFSI), as the starting materials. The reactions are broad in scope, efficient, and scalable. We show that the sulfondiimidoyl fluoride products can be combined with amines to provide sulfondiimidamides, and with organolithium reagents to provide sulfondiimines, and that reactivity in these transformations can be modulated by variation of the N-substituents.

Sulfur functional groups are ubiquitous in molecules used in the pharmaceutical and agrochemical industries, and within these collections sulfones hold a prominent position. The double aza-analogues of sulfones, sulfondiimines, offer significant potential in discovery chemistry but to date their applications have been limited by the lack of convenient synthetic routes. The existing methods mainly rely on imination of low-valent-sulfur intermediates, or the combination of pre-formed organometallic reagents and electrophilic S(VI)-functionalities. Herein, we describe a Friedel-Crafts-type reaction of sulfondiimidoyl fluorides with (hetero)aryls. This new SuFEx reactivity benefits from broad functional group tolerance, mild reaction conditions, and does not require the use of pre-formed organometallic reagents. The efficient use of unprotected indoles and pyrroles, as well as furan, thiophene and carbocyclic aromatics, further demonstrates the advantages of these reactions. We show that the reactivity of the sulfondiimidoyl fluorides can be tuned by switching the N-substituents, allowing an expansion of the range of coupling partners. The utility of the transformation is exemplified by the synthesis of the sulfondiimine analogue of the HIV-I reverse transcriptase-inhibitor L-737,126.

A new N-silyl sulfinylamine reagent allows the rapid preparation of a broad range of (hetero)aryl, alkenyl, and alkyl primary sulfinamides, using Grignard, organolithium, or organozinc reagents to introduce the carbon fragment. Treatment of these primary sulfinamides with an amine in the presence of a hypervalent iodine reagent leads directly to NH-sulfonimidamides. This two-step sequence is straightforward to perform and provides a modular approach to sulfonimidamides, allowing ready variation of both reaction components, including primary and secondary amines.

Sulfur functional groups are common motifs in bioactive molecules. Sulfonamides are most prevalent but related aza-derivatives, in which oxygen atoms are replaced by imidic nitrogens, such as sulfoximines and sulfonimidamides, are gaining attraction. Despite this activity, the double aza-variants of sulfonamides, termed sulfondiimidamides, are almost completely absent from the literature. The reason for this is poor synthetic accessibility. Although a recent synthesis has established sulfondiimidamides as viable motifs, the length of the route and the capricious nature of the key sulfondiimidoyl fluoride intermediates mean that direct application to discovery chemistry is challenging. Herein, we describe a two-step synthesis of sulfondiimidamides, exploiting a hypervalent iodine-mediated amination as the key step. The starting materials are organometallic reagents, an unsymmetrical sulfurdiimide, and amines. The method allowed >40 examples to be prepared, including derivatives of three sulfonamide-based drugs. The operational simplicity, broad scope, and concise nature make this route attractive for discovery chemistry applications.