Copper-catalyzed formal C-N bond cleavage of aromatic methylamines: assembly of pyridine derivatives.

An efficient copper-catalyzed C-N bond cleavage of aromatic methylamines was developed to construct pyridine derivatives. With neat conditions and facile operation, the fragment-assembling strategy affords a broad range of 2,4,6-trisubstituted pyridines in up to 95% yield from simple and readily available starting materials. Interestingly, when pyridin-2-yl methylamine was employed as the substrate, α-alkylation reaction of ketones readily occurred to give β-(pyridin-2-yl) ketones instead of the 2,4,6-trisubstituted pyridines.