Herein, we report
a green and efficient synthetic route for the
construction of diverse functionalized coumarins in good-to-excellent
yields (60–98%) via the Pechmann condensation. The optimized
synthetic route involves a biodegradable, reusable, and inexpensive
deep eutectic solvent (DES) of choline chloride and
l
-(+)-tartaric
acid in a ratio of 1:2 at 110 °C. Interestingly, phloroglucinol
and ethyl acetoacetate, upon reaction, furnished the functionalized
coumarin (
20
) in 98% yield within 10 min. On the other
front, the same DES at relatively lower reaction temperature (90 °C)
was found to provide the bis-coumarins in decent yields (81–97%)
within 20–45 min. Moreover, this particular method was found
to be quite effective for large-scale coumarin synthesis without noteworthy
reduction in the yields of the desired products. Noticeably, in this
versatile approach, the DES plays a dual role as solvent as well as
catalyst, and it was effectively recycled and reused four times with
no significant drop-down in the yield of the product.