Microwave-assisted synthesis of N-heterocycles in medicinal chemistry

Abstract

The syntheses of almost all N-heterocycles have now been successfully performed under microwave irradiation and have provided significant improvements in the reaction time and efficiency. The peculiar properties of dielectric heating give it the ability to strongly promote cyclocondensation, cycloaddition and selective N-heterocycle functionalisation and it has, therefore, very much caught the attention of the medicinal chemistry community. In this work, we present an overview of recent literature and technical advances in this research field with the aim of providing insight into the applications of microwave-assisted synthesis in the preparation of the main drug categories that contain N-heterocycle scaffolds.