Sulfonium ylides 1a-h reacted with sodium iodide to afford the corresponding thiopyrans 2a-h. On the other hand, compounds 1a-d were treated with thionyl chloride to give the ring opening products 3a-d. The reaction of compounds 3a-d with sodium iodide and triethylamine provided the corresponding thiopyrans 2a-d. J. Heterocyclic Chem., 39, 217 (2002). Thiopyrans are attractive compounds for chemical synthesis because their similarity with pyrans hints at useful biological properties that should be relatively easy to discover due to their simple framework [1,2]. Rearrangement of sulfonium ylides is known to produce thiopyrans [3,4]. This paper presents a new synthesis of thiopyrans from sulfonium ylides. In the course of our studies on heterocyclic enaminonitriles, we have shown that the reactions of 2-amino-4,5-dihydro-3-furancarbonitriles with sodium iodide [5,6] or titanium(IV) chloride [7] proceed through an initial ring opening between the oxygen and the 5-position of the furan ring by the attack of a halide ion on the 5-position of the furan ring. Under the same conditions, in the case of the corresponding 4,5-dihydro-3-thiophene carbonitriles, ring opening reactions did not take place. In contrast with 4,5-dihydro-3-thiophenecarbonitriles, the sulfonium ylides 1 of 4,5-dihydro-3-thiophenecarbonitriles undergo cleavage at the sulfur-C-5 bond and subsequent recyclization in the presence of a base [8]. These findings suggest that the sulfur-C-5 bond of the sulfonium ylides is more easily cleaved than that of 4,5-dihydro-3-thiophenecarbonitriles. Hence, we examined the reaction of the sulfonium ylides with sodium iodide to see whether or not cleavage at the sulfur-C-5 bond takes place. The starting compounds dihydrothiophenium-1-bis(ethoxycarbonyl)methylides 1a,c,e,g were prepared by previously reported method [8]. Dihydrothiophenium-1-bis(methoxycarbonyl)-methylides 1b,d,f,h were synthesized by the reaction of the corresponding 2-amino-4,5-dihydro-3-thiophenecarbonitriles [8] with dimethyl diazomalonate [9] in the presence of rhodium(II) acetate dimer.When a mixture of sulfonium ylides 1a,c-h and sodium iodide (2 equivalents) in acetone was refluxed for 7 hours, the corresponding 3,4-dihydro-2H-thiopyrans 2a,c-h were obtained, and the expected ring opening products could not be isolated. In a similar manner, no reaction occurred in the case of 1b, and 1b was recovered unchanged. When N,N-dimethylformamide was used in place of acetone, compound 1b reacted with sodium iodide at 100°to provide 2b. Although ring expansion of thiophenes to thiopyrans via a process involving sulfonium ylide intermediates has been reported [3,4], to our knowledge, ring expansion of sulfonium ylides by use of sodium iodide has not been