The treatment of amines with formic acid in the presence of ZnO under solvent-free conditions brings about highly and efficient N-formylation to give the corresponding formamides in excellent yields. The N-formylation reaction not only involves mild conditions, simple operation, and high yields but also high chemoselectivity.

Zinc oxide (ZnO) brings about a rapid Friedel-Crafts acylation of a range of activated and unactivated aromatic compounds such as anisole and chlorobenzene with acid chlorides in solvent-free conditions at room temperature. The ZnO powder can be reused up to three times after simple washing with dichloromethane.

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Nanosized sulfated titania was prepared by a sol-gel hydrothermal process. X-ray diffraction (XRD), transmission electron, and scanning electron micrographs (TEM and SEM), FT-IR specific surface area, and BET N(2) adsorption were employed to characterize the properties of the synthesized sulfated TiO(2). The results indicate that both anatase and rutile TiO(2) are obtainable. This prepared sulfated titania showed high catalytic activity in direct amidation of fatty acids as well as benzoic acids with various amines under solvent-free conditions.