Rapid and catalyst free synthesis of new bis(benzo [g]chromene) and bis(pyrano[3,2-c]chromene) derivatives and optimization of reaction conditions using response surface methodology † Fahimeh Sadat Hosseini, Mohammad Bayat * and Milad Afsharnezhad 4,4 0 -(1,4-phenylene)bis(2-(alkylamino)-3-nitro-4H-benzo[g]chromene-5,10-dione) and 4,4 0 -(1,4phenylene)bis(2-(alkylamino)-3-nitropyrano[3,2-c]chromen-5(4H)-one) derivatives are synthesized by a one-pot, multi-component reaction of N-alkyl-1-(methylthio)-2-nitroethenamine (derived from the reaction of various amines and 1,1-bis(methylthio)-2-nitroethene) with terephthalaldehyde or isophthalaldehyde, and 2-hydroxy-1,4-naphthoquinone or 4-hydroxycoumarin in EtOH/H 2 O (85 : 15) as the solvent at 89 C. Response surface methodology (RSM) is used to investigate the effect of reaction temperature and water content of aqueous ethanol on the product yields and reaction time. The notable features of this work are the optimization of reaction conditions with minimal experiments, absence of catalyst, good yields, simple work-up and the non-chromatographic purification of products. ; Tel: +98 28 33780040 † Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available. See a Various amines (2 mmol), 1,1-bis(methylthio)-2-nitroethene (2 mmol), phthalaldehyde (1 mmol), 2-hydroxy-1,4-naphthoquinone (2 mmol) and 4hydroxycumarin (2 mmol) were used. The reactions were run in EtOH/H 2 O (85 : 15) at 89 C, without any catalyst.Scheme 5 Proposed mechanism for the synthesis of product 6.This journal is