Cover Picture: Palladium-Catalyzed Aerobic Synthesis of Terminal Acetals from Vinylarenes Assisted by [pi]-Acceptor Ligands

The Front Cover shows a novel method to synthesize terminal acetals from vinylarenes and diols by palladium-catalyzed aerobic anti-Markovnikov oxidation.In their Full Paper, S. Matsumura etal. demonstrate that an electron-deficient cyclic alkene, i.e. methoxy-p-benzoquinone (MeOBQ), is a key additive that accelerates the reaction and affords high yields of the products by reducing the electron density of the palladium center upon coordination. The coordination of MeOBQ would also stabilize in situ generated Pd(0) species to suppress deactivation.