Eco-friendly syntheses of 2 , 2-disubstituted-and 2-spiroquinazolinones

Environmentally friendly methods were applied to pr epare quinazolin-4(1 H)-one derivatives in either aqueous or solventless medium from anthranil amide and a number of ketones. With dialkyl-substituted ketones, acetophenone and cyclo alkanones, the ring closure proceeded smoothly under either aqueous or solventless condit i s. With poorly water-soluble cycloalkanones, the ring closure was carried out un der mechanochemical ball-milling conditions, in the presence of molecular iodine as catalyst. Th e environmentally friendly protocols applied resulted in the corresponding quinazolinones in qua ntitative yields.


Introduction
Quinazolines are effective substances in medicinal chemistry that possess a broad spectrum of biological activities 1 , including antioxidant, antimicrobial, 2 anti-Alzheimer 3 and anticonvulsant 4 activities.Among the various quinazoline derivatives, 2-substituted and 2,2-disubstituted quinazolinone hybrids have been found to be good candidates for the treatment of leishmaniasis. 5 Incorporation of a spirocyclohexane moiety at position 2 of the quinazolinone heterocycle gives safer and potent anti-inflammatory and analgesic agents. 6Some spiro[heterocycloalkyl-2′(1′H)quinazolin]-4′(3′H)-ones demonstrate anti-amoebic activity in vitro 7 and have been investigated as central nervous system depressants.
We recently demonstrated that the spirocyclization of carbocyclic 2-aminocarbohydrazides with N-benzylpiperidinone in water at room temperature (rt) in the absence of any additive led to 3′-aminospiropiperidine-quinazolinones.Environmentally benign spirocyclization in either aqueous or solventless medium has been developed for the preparation of spiro[cyclohexane-1,2′-(1′H)-quinazolin]-4′(3′H)-ones by the reaction of equivalent amounts of (saturated or partially saturated) anthranilamide and cyclohexanone. 18ith the growing interest in environmentally friendly and atom-economic processes, the application of a green solvent (i.e.water) 19 or a solventless procedure 20 is considered a preferable route in organic chemistry.Aqueous chemistry protocols have attracted significant interest in synthetic processes. 21Water-mediated reactions have recently been termed "in-water" or "onwater" reactions, depending on the nature of the reactants (solubility). 22Water is the preferred reaction medium in the design of green chemical syntheses of heterocycles. 23Significant efforts have been devoted to achieving organic syntheses in aqueous medium, one aim being "all-water chemistry". 24n recent years, the solvent-free chemical synthesis of heterocycles has developed into powerful methodology: less toxic waste is produced, with less harm to the environment.Various new and innovative sustainable organic reactions and methodologies have made use of alternative energy input sources, such as microwaves, sonication, conventional and rt heating conditions, mechanochemical mixing and high-speed ball-milling. 25The utilization of mechanical force for solventless organic syntheses, in the form of either mechanical grinding 26 or milling, 27 has been widely introduced.As a procedure for mechanochemical solid-state reactions (dry co-grinding), 28 a number of chemical transformations have been studied, including the formation of amides, 29 thioureas 30 and metallodrugs, 31 coupling chemistry 32 and asymmetric reactions. 33A number of excellent reviews highlight the history and success of mechanochemistry. 34n this context, we set out to study the condensation of anthranilamide with (cyclo)alkanones for the synthesis of 2,2-disubstituted-and 2-spiroquinazolinones either in aqueous medium or under solventless conditions.

Results and Discussion
We initially studied the influence of solventless and catalyst-free conditions in the reaction of anthranilamide (1) and acetone (2a) as standard and model.From a mixture of 1 and 2a after 2 days at rt, only 2% of 2,2-dimethyl-2,3-dihydro-1H-quinazolin-4-one (3a) was obtained.This low yield could be explained by the fact that aromatic amines are less potent nucleophiles than the (cyclo)aliphatic derivatives.
The synthesis of 3a via the above starting compounds has been extensively studied.The most useful classical and modern methods for the preparation, presented in Table 1, reveal only a few examples involving green methodologies.
To overcome the limitations in our model reaction, we envisaged the use of a catalyst that could promote the cyclization process.Several research groups have implemented various strategies for the synthesis of nitrogen heterocycles where I 2 plays a key role as a mild Lewis acid in the Schiff-base formation and intramolecular ring closure by polarizing the carbonyl group. 13Some of these procedures comprised I 2 -catalysed multicomponent reactions. 48We chose solid I 2 as catalyst.
When the model reaction was performed under magnetic stirring in the presence of 1 mol% of I 2 , the reaction mixture solidified in 20-25 min.A 76% yield was obtained at rt in 35 min, and 3a was formed quantitatively after 12 h.Alternatively, 3a was prepared in aqueous medium.Because of the insufficient solubility of I 2 in water, 1 mol% of I 2 as Lugol's solution (I 2 /KI) was used.After stirring for 12 h at ambient temperature, the precipitated 3a was isolated by simple filtration in a yield of 76%.
With a successful procedure available, we first examined the aqueous condensation of ketones 2b-2h with 1.In 4 ml of water, a mixture of 4 mmol of 1, 1 ml of 1% I 2 /KI (Lugol's) solution and 1.1 equivalents of 2a-2c or 1 equivalent of 2d-2h was stirred in a closed vessel at rt for 12 h.3a-3c, 3e and 3f started to precipitated in about 30 min.After stirring for 12 h, 3a-3c and 3e, 3f were isolated by filtration (Table 2) [Method (i)].The in-water syntheses of 3d, 3g and 3h were carried out under reflux.The less water-soluble 2h gave 3h in moderate yield only under reflux in ethanol.The poor solubility of the alkanone in water appeared to restrict the water-mediated quinazolinone synthesis.Temp.
[°C] In view of the above observations, we further investigated the I 2 -catalysed solventless ringclosure reactions of various (cyclo)alkanones with 1.I 2 was dissolved in liquid (cyclo)alkanones 2b, 2c or 2e-2g; and 1 was then added.The reactions were complete in 12 h at rt (Table 3).Melt reactions were applied for the preparation of 3d and 3h-3k.Reaction mixtures of 2d or solid 2h-2k, I 2 and 1 were heated at 60 °C for 2 h.After 10-20 min, these mixtures solidified and the reactions gave 96-97% yields [Method ii)].
As mechanical ball-milling is an emerging solventless technique that can promote ecofriendly organic reactions, 50 we next investigated the mechanochemical synthesis of spirocyclic quinazolinones.The liquid-solid and solid-solid condensations of 2g-2k with 1 were carried out in a mixing ball-mill.The solid-state spirocyclization of 1 and 2l was also studied.All these reactions were performed at a 1:1 stoichiometric ratio of the reactants, in the presence of 5 mol% of I 2 .4.0 mmol of 1 and 2g-2l were placed in a 25 mL stainless-steel jar with two stainless-steel balls 15 mm in diameter, the vessel was closed, and milling was started at rt at 25 Hz.During the mechanochemical experiments, the temperature of the reaction vessel reached 60-70 °C.After a 60 min milling time, the formation of liquid eutectics (3h and 3k), eutectic melts 51 (3g and 3i) or powders (3j and 3l) was observed.The progress of the spirocyclization was monitored by TLC.On a silica gel plate developed with EtOAc-n-hexane (1:1, v/v), the following amounts of heterocycles were detected: 3h ~60%, 3k ~40%, 3g and 3i ~70-80%, and 3j and 3l ~90%.Milling was continued for an additional 1 h under the same conditions, leading to the formation of powder-like products, except in the case of 3k, which was in a liquid phase.Further mechanochemical treatment of the mixture of 1 and 2k for 1.5 h at 30 Hz yielded crude 3k in a yield of 97% as a powder.The ball-milling reactions therefore always led to powdery products (Table 4).
We were somewhat surprised to observe that the spirocyclization of 1 (mp 111-113 °C) with 2l (mp 256-258 °C) proceeded without the formation of a visible liquid state.This can be explained by the formation of instant "hot spots" during the mechanical process. 1 H NMR spectroscopy demonstrated that the yields of powders 3g-3l were nearly quantitative.It is important to note that paramagnetic iron particles abraded from the stainlesssteel balls led to extreme broadening of the lines in the NMR spectra.To eliminate this contamination, ZrO 2 milling balls were applied in a further mechanochemical study.The proton spectra of iron-polluted and crude ZrO 2 ball-milled 3l are compared in Figure 1.When elimination of the I 2 catalyst was essential, a simple aqueous work-up procedure was applied.Products prepared by Method ii were suspended by use of a magnetic stirrer in a mixture of 1 mL of 2% Na 2 S 2 O 5 and 9 mL of water for 10 min, then filtered and air-dried.In the mechanosynthesis (Method iii) of 3g-3l, 5 mL of 2% Na 2 S 2 O 5 and 5 mL of water were added to the milling jar and ball-mill mixing for 5 min furnished a fine suspension, which was filtered off, washed with 5 mL of water and air-dried.
[°C]  In conclusion, we have developed I 2 -mediated solvent-free and aqueous green syntheses of known and new quinazolinones.The condensations of anthranilamide with (cyclo)alkanones proceeded efficiently in/on water to provide convenient syntheses of 3a-3g in good to excellent yields without the need for further work-up.As new green methodology, we have demonstrated that various 2,2-disubstituted-or 2-spiroquinazolines can be prepared almost quantitatively under solventless conditions.We have also shown that ball-milling can be a useful method for the preparation of diverse 2-spiroquinazolinones from liquid/solid or solid/solid reactants.These methods have a number of advantages over other methods: the reaction techniques are very simple, and the syntheses occur under mild, green reaction conditions without the need for costly, highly sensitive catalysts.

Experimental Section
General.The products were characterized by comparison of their spectral data and melting points with those reported in the literature. 1 H NMR and 13 C NMR spectra of the dried crude mixtures were taken in d 6 -DMSO to confirm the formation of 3a-3l. 1 H NMR (400 Hz) and 13 C NMR (100 MHz) spectra were recorded on a Bruker Avance DRX 400 spectrometer with TMS as internal reference.Analytically pure samples of new compounds (3j and 3l) were prepared by crystallization from EtOAc.Melting points were determined on a Kofler apparatus.FT-IR spectra were recorded in KBr pellets on a Perkin-Elmer 100 FT-IR spectrometer.Elemental analyses were carried out on a Perkin-Elmer 2400 elemental analyser.Mass spectra were recorded on a Finnigan MAT 95S spectrometer.The ball-milling experiments were performed in a Retsch MM400 mixer mill with two stainlesssteel or ZrO 2 balls 15 mm in diameter in a stainless-steel jar (25 mL) at 25 Hz or 30 Hz at rt. Preparation of 2,2-disubstituted-and 2′-spiro-2,3-dihydroquinazolin-4(1H)-ones (3a-3l) Method i: To a stirred mixture of 1 (0.54 g, 4.0 mmol) in 1 mL of 1% I 2 /KI (1 g of I 2 and 1.6 g of KI in 100 ml of aqueous solvent) and 4 mL of water in a round-bottomed flask (25 mL), 2a-2c (4.4 mmol) or 2d-2h (4 mmol) was added in portions.The flask was sealed with a teflon cap.After vigorous stirring at rt for 12 h (for 3d, 3g and 3h, the aqueous suspension was heated under reflux for 3 h), 3a-3h precipitated.The products were filtered off, washed with water (2 mL) and dried.The purities of 3a-3h were established by 1 H NMR measurements.Method ii: 10 mg (1 mol%) of iodine was dissolved in 4.4 mmol of 2a-2c or 4.0 mmol of 2d-2k at rt or 60 °C (Table 2) in a round-bottomed flask (25 mL), which was sealed with a teflon cap.To the resulting solution, 0.54 g (4.0 mmol) of 1 was added and the mixture was stirred for 15 min.After standing at rt for 12 h (3a-3c and 3e-3g) or at 60 °C for 2 h (3d, 3h-3k), the excess of 2a-2c was removed by evaporation.The 1 H NMR data on the solidified products proved the presence of 3a-3k in 96-99% purity.
In the aqueous work-up procedure, the reaction mixture was suspended in a mixture of 1 ml of 2% Na 2 S 2 O 5 and 9 ml of water, and the resulting solid was filtered off, washed with water (2 mL) and dried.Method iii: 2g-2l (4.0 mmol), 1 (0.54 g, 4.0 mmol), 50 mg (5 mol%) of I 2 and two stainlesssteel or ZrO 2 balls 15 mm in diameter were placed in a stainless-steel jar.The vessel was vibrated at 25 Hz for 2 h.The reaction progress was monitored by TLC.The milling of the reaction mixture of 1 and 2k was continued for 1.5 h at 30 Hz (Table 4).The products were recovered as solids (directly from the jar) and dried.Crude 3g-3l were characterized by the determination of melting points and 1 H NMR. In the aqueous work-up procedure, 5 mL of 2% Na 2 S 2 O 5 solution and 5 mL of water were added to the reaction mixture in the jar.The aqueous suspension was mixed at 25 Hz for 5 min, filtered off, washed with water (5 mL) and dried.The isolated yields were determined after the aqueous work-up.Analytically pure samples of new compounds 3j and 3l (entries 4 and 6, Table 4) were recrystallized from EtOAc.Analytical and spectroscopic data on 3j and 3l are given below.

14 a
Conversion yields determined on the basis of 1 H NMR spectra.b The spectral data and the mp′s of the products corresponded well with literature values.c Melting points of crude products after aqueous work-up.d Isolated yields after aqueous work-up.

a
On the basis of 1 H NMR; b melting points of crude products; c at 30 Hz; d isolated yields from aqueous work-up; e from aqueous suspension; f recrystallized from EtOAc.