An Environmentally Benign, Catalyst-Free N-C Bond Cleavage/Formation of Primary, Secondary, and Tertiary Unactivated Amides

Herein, we report an operationally simple, cheap, and catalyst-free method for the transamidation of a diverse range of unactivated amides furnishing the desired products in excellent yields. This protocol is environmentally friendly and operates under extremely mild conditions without using any promoter or additives. Significantly, this strategy has been implied in the chemoselective synthesis of a pharmaceutical molecule, paracetamol, on a gram-scale with excellent yield. We anticipate that this universally applicable strategy will be of great interest in drug discovery, biochemistry, and organic synthesis.

Automated summary

This study presents a simple, cost-effective, and catalyst-free method for transamidation of unactivated amides with high yields. The protocol is environmentally friendly and operates under mild conditions, making it suitable for drug synthesis.