Oxidative C-N fusion of pyridinyl-substituted porphyrins.

The mild (electro) chemical oxidation of pyridin-2-ylthio-meso substituted Ni(II) porphyrins affords C-N fused cationic and dicationic pyridinium-based derivatives. These porphyrins are fully characterized and the molecular structure of one of them was confirmed by X-ray crystallography. A mechanism for the intramolecular oxidative C-N coupling is proposed based on theoretical calculations and cyclic voltammetry analyses.