Synthesis 2019; 51(17): 3221-3230
DOI: 10.1055/s-0037-1611835
paper
© Georg Thieme Verlag Stuttgart · New York

One-Pot Synthesis of Polysubstituted Imidazoles Based on Pd(OAc)2/Ce(SO4)2/Bi(NO3)3 Trimetallic Cascade of Decarboxylation/Wacker-Type Oxidation/Debus–Radziszewski Reaction

Authors

  • Wei Sun

    a   Department of Chemistry, Jinan University, Guangzhou 510632, P. R. of China   eMail: tlyq@jnu.edu.cn
  • Mingjuan Zhang

    a   Department of Chemistry, Jinan University, Guangzhou 510632, P. R. of China   eMail: tlyq@jnu.edu.cn
  • Peilang Li

    a   Department of Chemistry, Jinan University, Guangzhou 510632, P. R. of China   eMail: tlyq@jnu.edu.cn
  • Yiqun Li  *

    a   Department of Chemistry, Jinan University, Guangzhou 510632, P. R. of China   eMail: tlyq@jnu.edu.cn
    b   Key Laboratory of Synthetic Chemistry of Natural Substances, Shanghai Institute of Organic Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200032, P. R. of China

We are grateful to the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 21372099) for financial support.
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Publikationsverlauf

Received: 13. März 2019

Accepted after revision: 25. April 2019

Publikationsdatum:
27. Mai 2019 (online)


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Abstract

A novel and highly efficient one-pot synthesis of polysubstituted imidazoles from α-hydroxyphenylacetic acids, diphenylacetylene, and amines has been achieved by Pd(OAc)2/Ce(SO4)2/Bi(NO3)3 trimetallic catalytic system. A series of control experiments showed that this overall reaction occurs through a one-pot cascade process combining the steps of decarboxylation of α-hydroxyphenylacetic acids, Wacker-type oxidation of diphenylacetylene, and Debus–Radziszewski annulation of aryl aldehydes and benzil generated in situ, as well as amines. This reaction represents a novel multicomponent reaction using α-hydroxyphenylacetic acids and diphenylacetylene as sources of aryl aldehydes and a β-diketone. This process exhibits a broad substrate scope and a good functional group tolerance to assemble the corresponding polysubstituted imidazoles in excellent yields (72–88%) under mild conditions.

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