A Green, Scalable, One-Minute Synthesis of Benzimidazoles

Herein is reported a substantially improved synthesis of 2-substituted benzimidazoles by condensation of 1,2-diaminoarenes and aldehydes using methanol as the reaction medium. The developed method afforded moderate to excellent yields (33-96%) at ambient temperature, displays high functional group tolerance, is conducted open to air, and requires only one minute reaction time under catalyst- and additive-free conditions. Moreover, the efficient protocol permits scale-up to multi-gram scale synthesis of benzimidazoles and will become a method of choice when constructing such heterocyclic systems.