Amidophosphine Boranes as Easy Reducing Agents for Efficient Conversion of Nitro Compounds to Primary Amines With Iron Catalyst

Abstract

We report a direct and efficient methodology for the hydroboration of aliphatic and aryl nitro compounds using amidophosphine-borane {(C₆H₅)CH₂N(PPh)₂(BH₃)₂} in the presence of iron(II) chloride as a catalyst under mild conditions to form primary amines after hydrolysis. Solid amidophosphine-boranes are user-friendly and readily synthesized, revealing remarkable reducing properties toward a comprehensive range of nitro compounds. The scalability of the present approach is defined by performing gram-scale reactions and synthesis of different pharmaceuticals like paracetamol and benzocaine, demonstrating the synthetic applicability of the current strategy.