Amidation via borate esters
09 May 2013 - Organic chemistry
Lanigan et al. report a new reagent for coupling an amine with a carboxylic acid to form an amide (DOI). The reagent is the borate ester of trifluoroethanol B(OCH2CF3)3 for which they offer a new recipe starting from boron trioxide.
The yield of the reaction with boron trioxide alone is poor, chirality is retained with protected amino acids.