Nickel/Photoredox-Catalyzed Direct Amidation of Aldehydes with Nitroarenes via Fully Catalytic Process.

A fully catalytic nickel-photoredox process for the direct amidation of aldehydes with nitroarenes was developed. In this system, aldehydes and nitroarenes were catalytically activated by the photocatalytic cycle without the addition of an additional reductant or oxidants, which facilitated the Ni-mediated cross-coupling of the C-N bond under mild conditions. A preliminary mechanistic study indicates a reaction pathway in which nitrobenzene is directly reduced to aniline as the nitrogen source.