It is known that the combination of pharmacophoric fragments in a single molecule often leads to a strengthening and/or to a change in the pharmacological properties of the molecule. In this connection there is significant interest in studying compounds which contain indole and -aminobutyric acid (e.g. -butyrolactone) fragments in the molecule. A single compound of this type has been synthesized previously [1] but the method proposed by the authors is inconvenient and is not sufficiently general. Some time ago we carried a simple synthesis of the 2-alkyl-3-(indol-3-yl-and -2-yl)isoindol-2-ones 1 and 2 [2]. N O R 4 N R 1 R 2 N N O R 4 R 3 R 1 1 2We suggested that using this method can also prove useful for synthesizing the 1-alkyl-5-(indol-3-yl)-pyrrolidin-2-ones 3a-k. The 5-hydroxypyrrolidin-2-ones 4a-d needed for this were prepared from succinic anhydride and the corresponding amines 5a-d.The intermediate succinamic acids 6a-d were readily prepared by mixing succinic anhydride with the corresponding amine in stoichiometric quantities in chloroform. Their cyclization to the corresponding imides 7a-d occurs with prolonged refluxing in benzene in a DeanStark apparatus in the presence of equivalent

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have been obtained in good yield on amidoalkylation of indoles with 2-alkyl-3-hydroxyphthalides in chloroform at room temperature in the presence of catalytic quantities of boron trifluoride etherate. When a substituent is present at position 3 of the indole, attack is directed to position 2 of the indole nucleus.

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