Versatile access to Martin's spirosilanes and their hypervalent derivatives.

A new route to Martin's spirosilanes has been devised. The original synthesis does not allow diversely substituted spirosilane derivatives to be synthesized, and thus their corresponding silicates. In this report, Martin's spirosilanes bearing alkyl, aryl, halogen, alkoxy, and trifluoromethyl substituents on the aryl ring have been prepared through a versatile four-step route.

Spirosilane derivatives as fluoride sensors.

Spirosilane derivatives have been investigated as fluoride sensors. The reactions between these compounds and different fluoride sources, which resulted in structural alterations, have been monitored and quantified by UV and fluorescence spectroscopy. The high selectivity of these probes for fluoride ions has been demonstrated in either organic or aqueous media.