Discovery of a novel acaricide, acynonapyr

Acynonapyr, discovered by Nippon Soda Co., Ltd., is a novel acaricide with N-pyridyloxy azabicycle as a unique core structure. Acynonapyr exhibits high activity against the spider mite species in the genera Tetranychus and Panonychus, with good efficacy at all life stages. Early in this research, cyclic amines substituted with (hetero)aryl(oxy) moieties were designed as target molecules and diversely synthesized, and 4-[4-(trifluoromethyl)phenoxy]-1-[5-(trifluoromethyl)-2-pyridyl]piperidine was found to show weak acaricidal activity. The structural optimization of this acaricidal active piperidine as the first lead compound led to the discovery of acynonapyr. In this report, our research process that led to the discovery of acynonapyr is described.