A 100-mL single-neck round-bottomed flask equipped with a magnetic stirrer and nitrogen inlet was charged with 106c (390 mg, 2.05 mmol), 102d (1.26 g, 4.10 mmol), cesium carbonate (1.34 g, 4.10 mmol), N,N′-dimethylethylenediamine (181 mg, 2.05 mmol) and 1,4-dioxane (12 mL). After bubbling nitrogen through the resulting suspension for 30 min, copper iodide (195 mg, 1.03 mmol) was added. A reflux condenser was attached to the flask, and the reaction mixture was heated at 105° C. for 16 h. After this time, the mixture was cooled to room temperature and filtered. The filtrate was diluted with ethyl acetate (150 mL) and water (75 mL), and the layers were separated. The aqueous layer was extracted with ethyl acetate (2×50 mL), and the combined organic layers were washed with brine (100 mL) and dried over sodium sulfate. The drying agent was removed by filtration. The filtrate was concentrated under reduced pressure, and the resulting residue was purified by flash column chromatography (silica, 70:30 hexanes/ethyl acetate) to afford 106d in 50% yield (427 mg) as a white solid: mp 97-99° C.; 1H NMR (500 MHz, CDCl3) δ 7.74 (d, J=8.5 Hz, 1H), 7.63 (dd, J=8.0, 1.5 Hz, 1H), 7.30-7.25 (m, 2H), 6.80 (dd, J=8.5, 2.0 Hz, 1H), 6.66 (d, J=1.5 Hz, 1H), 5.21 (s, 2H), 4.69 (s, 2H), 3.51 (q, J=7.0 Hz, 2H), 3.21 (s, 3H), 1.99 (s, 3H), 1.19 (t, J=7.0 Hz, 3H); MS (ESI+) m/z 417.1 (M+H).
