An environmental friendly approach for the synthesis of highly substituted imidazoles using Bronsted acidic ionic liquid, N-methyl-2-pyrrolidonium hydrogen sulfate, as reusable catalyst

Bronsted acidic ionic liquid, N-methyl-2-pyrrolidonium hydrogen sulfate, has been used as an efficient and reusable catalyst for the one-pot synthesis of 2,4,5-trisubstituted and 1,2,4,5-tetrasubstituted imidazoles under thermal solvent-free conditions in excellent yields. (C) 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.