The reaction of 1,3-disubstituted uracils possessing an electron-withdrawing group such as nitro, carbamoyl, and cyano at the 5-position with primary amines resulted in the exchange of the N1portion of the uracil ring with the amine moiety. The exchange reactions were influenced by the nature of substituents at the 5and N1-position. The reaction sequence is explained in terms of addition, ring-opening, and ring-closure.Reactions of uracil derivatives with various nucleophiles have been extensively studied in connection with the biosynthesis of thymidylate,2 the chemical modification of nucleic acids,3 and ring-transformation reactions for the synthesis of heterocycles."6 The uracil ring system is susceptible to nucleophilic attack at the 6-position. In particular, the presence of electron-withdrawing groups at the 5-position markedly increases the reactivity towards nucleophiles. 5-Nitrouracils are most reactive and suffer smooth addition of nucleophiles, such as -OEt,' -OH,* S 0 3 2 -, 9 and -CN," across the 5,6-double bond to form 5,6-dihydrouracils, which revert to the nitrouracils upon treatment with acid (Scheme 1).Scheme 1.The reaction of 5-nitrouracils with amines, however, has never been studied in detail.? During our investigation on the ring transformation of uracils to various heterocycles, we found that 5-nitrouracils reacted with amines to afford exchange reaction of the N'-portion in the uracil ring for the employed amine." This type of reaction was also observed in the 5carbamoyl-and 5-cyano-uracil derivatives. This paper describes in full detail the novel type of exchange reaction which is operated by a sequence of addition, ring-opening, and ringclosure processes, and is influenced by virtue of the nature of substituents at the 5and N'-positions in the uracil ring.Upon refluxing of 1,3-dimethy1-5-nitrouracil (la) with an t Fox and his co-workers report in a footnote of ref. 8 that the reaction of 1,3-dimethyl-5-nitrouracil with amines and hydrazine furnishes the corresponding 5,6-dihydro-adducts and that these amine adducts are hydrolysed easily by traces of water to give back the starting material.1 The nitration of 3-methyl-1-phenyluracil gave the dinitro compound (lc) rather than the expected product (1; R = Ph).5The 'H n.m.r. spectrum analysis of (3) suggests that the anion site is at the urea moiety; the chemical shift for ottho-protons of the pnitrophenyl group was observed at higher field (6 6.46) compared with those (6 7.66-7.78) for other ring-opening products (6) and (14). * Boiling range 75-120 "C. 5,6-Dihydro-3-methyl-5-nitro-1 -(p-nitropheny1)uracil (5)-Sodium borohydride (0.07 g, 1.85 mmol) was added to a Paper 9/02601 K