Towards synthesis of heteroarenes

• Main Author: Ho, Clarence Guan Yang
• Other Authors: Andrew Clive Grimsdale
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: 2017
• Subjects: DRNTU::Engineering::Materials::Energy materials
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/70671
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

This project aims to synthesize heteroarenes, namely triphenylene compounds that are soluble in organic solvents. The purpose of this, is to synthesize a liquid based polyaromatic system, to be used in lithium solvated electron solutions as electron acceptors for energy storage purposes. Documented synthesis methods of similar triphenylene compounds are explored in an effort to obtain the desired product. The synthesis approach undertook revolves around a series of reactions between different benzene groups, to form carbon-carbon bonds between them, in order to obtain the product. Some of the reactions employed in our experiments are, Kumada coupling, Suzuki coupling, Scholl reaction, and Sonogashira coupling. In the end, we concluded that our products could not be obtained due to certain factors such as, unexpectedly low selectivity of the reaction during Scholl reaction and poor solubility of the reactants in the solvents during Sonogashira coupling. We proposed that future works should seek to optimize, Sonogashira coupling reactions such as the temperature, solvents and the type of catalysts used for the reactions.