A Simple and Efficient Catalytic System for N-Arylation of Imidazoles in Water

A study was conducted to develop a simple and efficient catalytic system for N-arylation of immidazoles in water. Demonstrations revealed that the catalytic system contained a number of significant advantages. Some of these advantages included the use of water as a green solvent in place of volatile organic solvents and the catalysis was performed without an inert gas atmosphere and with low catalyst loading. Investigations revealed that the presence of catalyst and PTC were essential for the catalysis reaction. The scope of aryl halide substrates was investigated by using the catalytic system under the optimized reaction conditions. It was also demonstrated that the catalytic system tolerated a variety of functionalized aryl halides in the reaction, including nitrile, nitro, acetyl, and ether groups. The new catalytic system was applied to a variety of imidazole derivatives to expand the scope of the methodology.