Conversion of N‐Acetyl‐D‐glucosamine into 3‐Acetamido‐5‐acetylfuran Using Cheap Ammonium Chloride as Catalyst

Abstract Herein, we propose a facile method for converting N ‐acetyl‐D‐glucosamine (NAG) into the N‐containing chemical 3‐acetamido‐5‐acetylfuran (3A5AF) using chloride salt as a catalyst. Screening of various chloride salts showed that NH 4 Cl possessed the optimal catalytic performance. The catalyst NH 4 Cl led to a 3A5AF yield of 43 mol % with LiCl as an additive in N,N ‐dimethylformamide (DMF) solvent at 160 °C for 5 min. Moreover, the solvent, catalyst and additive could be reused at least five times with residual catalytic activity of 94.42 %. Additionally, scaling up of the 3A5AF preparation could be easily realized and the purity of the product 3A5AF reached >99 % purity with 45 mol % isolated yield after a simple isolation procedure. This work provides an environmentally friendly and mild method for converting NAG into 3A5AF.