The oxidation of organic sulphides is very fast with peracids and very slow with hydrogen peroxide. Thus, addition of an excess of methyl p-tolyl sulphide to a mixture of an organic peracid and hydrogen peroxide results in the formation of methyl p-tolyl sulphoxide equimolar with the peracid. The gas-chromatographic determination of the residual sulphide, or of the produced sulphoxide, affords a quantitative evaluation of the peracid present in the mixture. The method has been applied to the determination of m-chloroperbenzoic acid and peracetic and perpropionic acids.

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General experimental details, gas chromatograms of 26, and 1H and ®F NMR spectra of 44, 45, and 47 (13 pages). Ordering information is given on any current masthead page.

The one-pot synthesis of the title compounds (1) is achieved by reacting acetophenones and nitrobenzenes in 2-propanol with potassium 2-propoxide. The stereochemistry of the 2-butenes has been determined to be Z from an X-ray analysis. Hydrolysis and reaction with hydrazine are reported as examples of the reactivity of the title compounds.1,4-Diketones are useful starting materials for the synthesis of a number of heterocycles.1 The but-2-ene-l,4dione system and its functionalized derivatives are potentially even more valuable. Their use2 has, however, been limited because of their relatively difficult synthesis.We have developed a very simple, one-pot synthesis leading to l,4-diaryl-2-(arylamino)-but-2-ene-l,4-diones (1, ArC(0)C(NHAr)=CHC(0)Ar). The determination of the configuration around the double bond and examples of the reactivity of 1 are also described in this paper. Results and DiscussionSynthesis of l,4-Diaryl-2-(aryiamino)but-2-ene-l,4diones. Addition of potassium 2-propoxide to a boiling solution of variously substituted acetophenones and nitrobenzenes in 2-propanol gives, after 1-2 h at reflux, compound 1 in fair to good amounts (eq 1

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