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RESEARCHERS at Northwestern University, US, have discovered a pair of catalysts that will work together to produce large quantities of gamma-lactam, an important pharmaceutical building block.

Catalysis is often a multi-stage process, but a team at Northwestern, led by chemistry professor Karl Scheidt found that two catalysts which on paper should bind together, rendering them ineffective, actually work efficiently together when both have substrates available to them.

The first catalyst, a magnesium salt that acts as a Lewis acid, works with the second, N-heterocyclic carbene, to add homoenolate equivalents to hydrazones, producing gamma lactam in a reaction that is efficient and controlled and gives moderate to good yields.

Scheidt says: “Getting two catalysts that are seemingly incompatible to work together is a significant advance. Now we have a great first step to realising the full potential of this powerful cooperative catalysis strategy. Ultimately, this approach should allow chemists to combine simple components under catalytic conditions to generate new bioactive compounds of high value.”

Nature Chemistry doi: 10.1038/nchem.727