Iodination of phenols in water using easy to handle amine-iodine complexes

The reaction between iodo and N-methyl-piperazine or thiomorpholine in water, in the presence of KI, led to the formation of stable and easy to handle amine-iodine complexes, as the complex morpholine-iodo previously reported in the literature. However, the complex obtained using N,N-tetrametylethylenediamine proved less stable, while no complex was formed when piperidine was used as base. These results show that the presence of a second heteroatom in the structure of amines is of fundamental importance for the formation and stability of these complexes. In this work we describe, for the first time, the use of complexes morpholine-iodo, N-methyl-piperazine-iodo and thiomorpholine-iodo as iodinating reagents of several substituted phenols, leading to iodinated products in good to excellent yields.