One-Pot Synthesis of Push–Pull Butadienes from 1,3-Diethyl-2-thiobarbituric Acid and Propargylic Alcohols

Abstract

A new synthetic procedure for obtaining two previously reported donor-acceptor butadiene dyes, namely 5-(3,3-bis(4-methoxyphenyl)allylidene)-1,3-diethyl-2-thioxodihydropyrimidine-4,6(1H,5H)-dione and 5-(3,3-bis(4-(dimethylamino)phenyl)allylidene)-1,3-diethyl-2-thioxodihydropyrimidine-4,6(1H,5H)-dione, based on the InCl3-catalyzed coupling 1,3-diethyl-2-thiobarbituric acid with 1,1-bis(4-methoxyphenyl)prop-2-yn-1-ol and 1,1-bis(4-(dimethylamino)phenyl)prop-2-yn-1-ol, respectively, is presented. The reactions, which cleanly proceed in water under MW irradiation, involve the initial generation of the corresponding enals by Meyer-Schuster rearrangement of the alkynols and their subsequent Knoevenagel condensation with the 2-thiobarbituric acid derivative. By following the same approach, the novel butadiene 5-(3,3-bi([1,1′-biphenyl]-4-yl)allylidene)-1,3-diethyl-2-thioxodihydropyrimidine-4,6(1H,5H)-dione, which was characterized by 1H and 13C{1H} NMR, IR, UV-Vis, elemental analysis and HRMS, was synthesized in 79% yield.