Selective synthesis of secondary amines from nitriles using Pt nanowires as a catalyst

Nitriles can be reduced to primary amines using reducing agents like lithium aluminum hydride or catalytic hydrogenation. The reduction introduces an amino group with an extra carbon in the skeleton. Nitriles are formed from the reaction between alkyl halides and sodium cyanide through the SN2 mechanism. Primary alkyl halides are the preferred substrates to prepare nitriles.
Amides can be reduced to primary, secondary, and tertiary amines using catalytic hydrogenation, active metals like Fe,...

Direct alkylation of ammonia produces polyalkylated amines, along with a quaternary ammonium salt. To exclusively prepare primary amines, the azide synthesis method can be used.
Azide ions act as good nucleophiles and react with unhindered alkyl halides to form alkyl azides. Alkyl azides do not participate in further nucleophilic substitution reactions, thereby eliminating the chances of polyalkylated products. Alkyl azides are reduced by hydride-based reducing agents, like lithium aluminum...

Direct alkylation is not a suitable method for synthesizing amines because it produces polyalkylated products. Gabriel synthesis is the most preferred method to exclusively make primary amines. The method uses phthalimide, which contains a protected form of nitrogen that participates in alkylation only once to predominantly give primary amines.
Strong bases like NaOH or KOH deprotonate the phthalimide to form the corresponding anion, which acts as a nucleophile. Further, the anion attacks an...

Carbonyl compounds and primary amines undergo reductive amination first to produce imines, followed by secondary amines in the same reaction mixture, using selective reducing agents like sodium cyanoborohydride or sodium triacetoxyborohydride. Reductive amination produces different degrees of substitution of amines depending on the starting amine substrate.

Secondary amines react with nitrous acid to form N-nitrosamines, as depicted in Figure 1. Nitrous acid, a weak and unstable acid, is formed in situ from an aqueous solution of sodium nitrite and strong acids, such as hydrochloric acid or sulfuric acid, in cold conditions. In the presence of an acid, the nitrous acid gets protonated. The subsequent loss of water results in the formation of the electrophile known as nitrosonium ion.

One of the common methods to prepare nitriles is the dehydration of amides. This method requires strong dehydrating agents like phosphorous pentoxide or boiling acetic anhydride for converting amides to nitriles. Another reagent namely, thionyl chloride also accomplishes the dehydration of amides, where amide acts as a nucleophile. The first step of the mechanism involves the nucleophilic attack by the amide on the thionyl chloride to form an intermediate. In the next step, the electron pairs...