Abstract
Herein, we disclose the discovery and development of a site-, regio-, diastereo-, and enantioselective aryl C-H bond cyclopropylation using diazomethyl hypervalent iodine reagents, styrenes, and paddlewheel dirhodium carboxylate catalysts. A key aspect of this work was the catalytic generation of a chiral Rh(II) carbene through an electrophilic aromatic substitution with chiral Rh(II) carbynoids. The strategy allows the construction of cyclopropane rings using aryl C-H bonds from aromatic feedstocks and drug molecules and promises to reach an unexplored "cyclopropanated" chemical space highly difficult to reach by current strategies.