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Published on: May 21, 2019
Visible-light-driven Photocatalytic N-arylation of Imidazole Derivatives and Arylboronic Acids on Cu/graphene
Yan-Li Cui1, Xiao-Ning Guo2, Ying-Yong Wang2
11] State Key Laboratory of Coal Conversion, Institute of Coal Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Taiyuan 030001, China [2] University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences Beijing 100039, China.
Abstract:
N-aryl imidazoles play an important role as structural and functional units in many natural products and biologically active compounds. Herein, we report a photocatalytic route for the C-N cross-coupling reactions over a Cu/graphene catalyst, which can effectively catalyze N-arylation of imidazole and phenylboronic acid, and achieve a turnover frequency of 25.4 h(-1) at 25°C and the irradiation of visible light. The enhanced catalytic activity of the Cu/graphene under the light irradiation results from the localized surface plasmon resonance of copper nanoparticles. The Cu/graphene photocatalyst has a general applicability for photocatalytic C-N, C-O and C-S cross-coupling of arylboronic acids with imidazoles, phenols and thiophenols. This study provides a green photocatalytic route for the production of N-aryl imidazoles.
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