A catalytic synthetic strategy has been developed combining two protocols, such as, direct nucleophilic substitution of alcohols followed by X‐ to N‐ alkyl group migration (X=O, S) to access N‐functionalized benzoxazolones, benzothiazolethiones, indolinone, benzoimidazolethiones, and pyridinones derivatives. Methyl trifluoromethanesulfonate (MeOTf) was found to catalyze the reaction, which revealed the catalytic property of MeOTf. A mechanism was established through experiments as well as DFT calculations wherein the −OH group of alcohols were converted to the corresponding −OMe groups and in situ generated TfOH. The −OMe groups produced underwent TfOH catalyzed −X alkylation (X=O, S) of the heterocycles followed by −X‐ to −N‐alkyl group migrations in a single step.

information for this article is given via a link at the end of the document. Scheme 1. Previous reports of alcoholysis of amides, nucleophilic substitution of alcohols and this work.

Methyl trifluoromethanesulfonate was found to catalyze the reaction of the nucleophilic substitution of the hydroxyl group of alcohols by N-heterocycles followed by X- to N- alkyl group migration (X = O, S) to obtain N-functionalized benzoxazolone, benzothiazolethione, indoline, benzoimidazolethione and pyridinone derivatives. A high degree of solvent dependency on the yield of the products was observed during optimization of the reaction parameters. The yield of the product was found to be 0%, 48% and 70% in acetonitrile, 1,2-dichloroethane and chloroform, respectively. The mechanism of the reaction was established through experiments as well as DFT calculations. The functional B3LYP and 6-311++G(d) basis function sets were used to optimize the molecular geometries. D3 Grimme empiric dispersion with Becke–Johnson dumping was employed, and harmonic vibrational frequencies were calculated to characterize the stationary points on the potential energy surface. To ensure that all the stationary points were smoothly connected to each other, intrinsic reaction coordinate (IRC) analyses were performed. The influence of solvents was considered using the solvation model based on density (SMD). The free energy profiles of the mechanisms were obtained with vibrational unscaled zero-point vibrational energy (ZPE), thermal, enthalpy, entropic and solvent corrections.

A reaction between 2-alkoxynaphthalene and in situ formed azaoxyallyl cation has been reported under ambient reaction condition. (3+2) cycloaddition reaction followed by aryl C–OMe/C–OEt bond cleavage produces a variety of...