An economical and safe procedure to synthesize 2-hydroxy-4-pentynoic acid: A precursor towards ‘clickable’ biodegradable polylactide

• Quanxuan Zhang,
• Hong Ren and
• Gregory L. Baker

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2014, 10, 1365–1371, doi:10.3762/bjoc.10.139

• synthetic route to prepare 1 using cheap and commercially available diethyl 2-acetamidomalonate (4) and propargyl alcohol. The desired product 1 was obtained via alkylation of malonate 4 with propargyl tosylate followed by a one-pot four-step sequence of hydrolysis, decarboxylation, diazotization and

• hydroxylation of propargylic malonate 5 without work-up of any intermediate. Keywords: alkylation; ‘click’ chemistry; ‘clickable’ polylactide; decomposition; diethyl 2-acetamidomalonate; 2-hydroxy-4-pentynoic acid; one-pot; optimization; propargyl bromide; propargyl tosylate; safe and economical; Introduction

• economical and safe procedure using diethyl 2-acetamidomalonate (4) and propargyl alcohol as starting materials to synthesize 1. The synthesis was completed via alkylation of malonate 4 with propargyl tosylate followed by a one-pot four-step sequence of hydrolysis, decarboxylation, diazotization and