Substituent-Determined Intramolecular Hydrogen Transfer for Photopromoted Intermolecular Cycloaddition of Anthraquinones with Aryl Olefins

The formation of intramolecular hydrogen bonds in anthraquinones makes them inert to photoinduced reactions; therefore, it is a great challenge to phototransform these compounds. Herein, we reported a formal visible-light-induced [4 + 2] cycloaddition of both 1-hydroxyanthraquinones and 1-aminoanthraquinones with olefins under external photocatalyst-free conditions with high regioselectivity. More than 60 substrates are disclosed, demonstrating the reliability of this protocol to construct diverse functionalized anthraquinone derivatives.