The behavior of α,α-diacetyl ketene dibenzylthioacetal 1a under basic conditions was studied. Catalyzed by steric hindered base as t-BuONa(in t-BuOH), α-acetyl ketene dibenzylthioacetal 2a could be obtained in 98% yield within 3 min via deacylation of 1a. Assisted by t-BuONa(in t-BuOH), α-cinnamoyl ketene dibenzylthioacetals were produced in high yields by reacting both 1a and 2a with arylaldehydes; whereas, under the same conditions, the corresponding α,α-dicinnamoyl ketene dibenzylthioacetals 4 were formed when furan-2-carbaldehyde and thiophene-2-carbaldehyde were used as the electrophiles. These evidences support the proposed mechanism that, catalyzed by t-BuONa (in t-BuOH), the reaction of 1a with arylaldehydes may normally proceed via a sequential deacylation-condensation process and the formation of double condensation products 4 may be due to the higher activity of furan-2-carbaldehyde and thiophene-2-carbaldehyde under the selected reaction conditions.
