A one-pot telescopic synthesis of benzo[ b ]carbazoles and exploration of their liquid crystalline properties.

We describe a diversity-oriented one-pot telescopic synthesis of various benzo[ b ]carbazoles with the naphthannulation of indoles as the key step, enabled by an intramolecular furan-olefin Diels-Alder reaction. This strategy is general and efficient across a wide range of substrates. We applied this method to synthesize and characterize the first benzo[ b ]carbazole-based liquid crystalline materials, where the unique molecular design led to the formation of a rare nematic phase at room temperature.