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

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
,
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
› Author Affiliations

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

Publication History

Received: 13 March 2019

Accepted after revision: 25 April 2019

Publication Date:
27 May 2019 (online)


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.

Supporting Information