Direct Synthesis of Indanes via Iron‐Catalyzed Dehydrative Coupling/Friedel–Crafts Cyclization of Two Different Alcohols.

We report herein a novel iron‐catalyzed cascade dehydrative coupling/Friedel–Crafts cyclization of two different alcohols, providing a variety of indanes, which are ubiquitous substructures found in natural products, pharmaceuticals, and functional materials. Importantly, the developed approach is highly atom‐economic and environmentally benign, as it employs readily available alcohols as substrates and generates water as the only byproduct. A novel iron‐catalyzed cascade dehydrative coupling/Friedel–Crafts cyclization of two different alcohols to indanes has been developed. This approach is highly atom‐economic and environmentally benign, as it employs readily available alcohols as substrates and generates only water as byproduct. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]