ABSTRACT
KCN has been found an efficient catalyst in the amidation reaction of methyl esters with formamide or N-methylformamide. The amidation reaction has been tried with other sources of cyanide like NaCN/18-C-6 or tetrabutylammonium cyanide with comparable results. Potassium cyanide is an efficient catalyst in common exchange reactions such as transesterification protecting group removal from peptides and aminolysis of esters. It was of interest to examine the role of KCN in a less known exchange reaction namely in ester to amide conversion. This type of amidation reaction was successfully carried out with sodium methoxide as a catalyst. This chapter reports an investigation of the amidation reaction of methyl esters with formamide and N-methylformamide in the presence of KCN and other sources of cyanide ions.
