Various fluorine-containing 1,10-phenanthrolines were synthesized in excellent yields by the reaction of 5,7-bis(trifluoroacetyl)-8-quinolylamine with ketones in the presence of aqueous ammonia.1,10-Phenanthroline and the related derivatives are important heterocyclic systems because of being applicable to important chelating ligands forming stable complexes with transition metals. 1 Furthermore, some of these complexes have been useful in studies of not only the novel catalysts 2 such as phase-transfer and asymmetric ones but also the DNA binding properties which can be expected to develop novel probes of nucleic acid structure and function. 3 Besides, much attention in recent years has been focused on the development of new methodologies for the syntheses of many kinds of fluorine-containing heterocycles, since these compounds are now widely recognized as important organic materials showing specific functions as well as interesting biological activities. 4Recently, we have reported that N,N-dimethyl-5,7-bis(trifluoroacetyl)-8-quinolylamine 1 undergoes a novel aromatic nucleophilic substitution with amines under mild conditions to give the corresponding 5,7-bis(trifluoroacetyl)-8-quinolylamines in excellent yields. 5 Moreover, we have set about the investigations on utilization of 5,7-bis(trifluoroacetyl)-8-quinolylamine 2, which can be easily prepared by the Me 2 N-NH 2 exchange reaction of 1 with ammonia, 5 as a new and convenient building block for construction of CF 3 -containing heterocycles having a quinoline skeleton. Thus, the facile synthetic method for pyrido[3,2-h]quinazolines 3, 4 from 2, using aldehydes and ammonia was found (Scheme 1). 6 In a continuation of this work, we have investigated the reaction of 2 with ketones instead of aldehydes, in the presence of ammonia, with the aim of synthesizing the desired fluorine-containing 1,10-phenanthrolines 5a−h. The results are shown in Scheme 2 and summarized in Table 1. The physical and spectral data are shown in Table 2.We examined the reaction of 2 with acetone, as a symmetrical ketone, in the presence of aqueous ammonia, which proceeded easily under mild conditions to afford selectively the desired 1,10-phenanthroline derivative 5a in 98% yield. It is noteworthy that the pyrido[3,2-h]quinazoline derivative, like 3, was not formed at all, in contrast to the reaction of 2 with aldehydes. 6 Similarly, 2-ethyl-3-methyl derivative 5b was also prepared quantitatively by the reaction of 2 with 3-pentanone under slightly forced conditions. Next, we attempted to carry out the reaction of 2 with cyclic ketones in order to synthesize 1,10-phenanthrolines fused by a cycloalkane ring. Expectedly, the desired ring-forming reaction of 2 with cyclopentanone, cyclohexanone and cycloheptanone took place cleanly at room temperature for 48 hours to afford 5c−e in almost quantitative yields. Further, the present reaction was applicable to some unsymmetrical ketones such as 2-butanone and 3-methyl-2-butanone. In both cases, the desired 1,10-phenanthrolines 5f, g were obta...