Organomercurials including methylmercury are ubiquitous environmental pollutants and highly toxic to humans. Now it could be shown that N-methylimidazole based thiones/selones having an N-CH2CH2OH substituent are remarkably effective in detoxifying various organomercurials to produce less toxic HgE (E=S, Se) nanoparticles. Compounds lacking the N-CH2CH2OH substituent failed to produce HgE nanoparticles upon treatment with organomercurials, suggesting that this moiety plays a crucial role in the detoxification by facilitating the desulfurization and deselenization processes. This novel way of detoxifying organomercurials may lead to the discovery of new compounds to treat patients suffering from methylmercury poisoning.

The activation and functionalization of CÀ F bonds in various fluoroorganics were found to be a daunting task owing to their innate inertness. Harnessing the CÀ F bonds will alleviate the toxicity and environmental issues posed by them, and provide new pathways to access value-added products. Although several strategies have been employed such as metal complexes, Brønsted acids, Lewis acids, and photocatalyst to activate the CÀ F bonds, however, the use of NHC or Metal-NHC is relatively scarce. NHCs based catalytic CÀ F activation stands out owing to its easy accessibility, stability, and facile reactivity. Metal-NHCs were exploited in hydrodefluorination, CÀ C, and CÀ B coupling reactions. Additionally, RÀ M(F)(NHC), an oxidative-addition intermediate that was conveniently isolated allows to decode catalytic CÀ F functionalization pathways. This minireview provides the prominence of NHC and metal-NHC in the area of catalytic CÀ F bond functionalization.

Imidazolium salts have been effectively employed as suitable acyl transfer agents in amidation and esterification in organic synthesis. The weak acyl C­(O)–C imidazolium bond was exploited to generate acyl electrophiles, which further react with amines and alcohols to afford amides and esters. The broad substrate scope of anilines and benzylic amines and base-promoted conditions are the benefits of this route. Interestingly, phenol, benzylic alcohols, and a biologically active alcohol can also be subjected to esterification under the optimized conditions.

Organomercurials including methylmercury are ubiquitous environmental pollutants and highly toxic to humans.N ow it could be shown that N-methylimidazole based thiones/selones having an N-CH 2 CH 2 OH substituent are remarkably effective in detoxifying various organomercurials to produce less toxic HgE (E = S, Se) nanoparticles.C ompounds lackingt he N-CH 2 CH 2 OH substituent failed to produce HgE nanoparticles upon treatment with organomercurials,s uggesting that this moiety playsacrucial role in the detoxification by facilitating the desulfurization and deselenization processes.T his novel wayo fd etoxifying organomercurials mayl ead to the discovery of new compounds to treat patients suffering from methylmercury poisoning.

We report a direct and effective metal-free αacylation of 2-oxindoles using C-acyl imidazolium salts as an acylating agent via C(O)À C bond cleavage. The mild reaction conditions, affordable base, additive-free and simple substrates make this methodology very attractive for easy access to 3-alkylidene oxindoles -privilege biologically active oxindole derivatives. The wide substrate scope and gram-scale preparation are notable features of this methodology. 4 5 6 7 8