Reactions of 2,2-dihydropolyfluoroalkylaldehydes with amines: a facile synthetic method for fluoroalkyl enaminoketones

Reactions of 2,2-dihydropolyfluoroalkylaldehydes (1) with amines (2) were studied. Both aliphatic amines and electron-deficient aromatic amines readily reacted with 1 in acetonitrile and water under reflux to give fluoroalkyl enaminoketones (3) in high yields, while no condensed products were obtained by reactions of 1 with electron-rich aromatic amines under similar conditions. In the presence of triethylamine, however, the reaction of 1 with electron-rich aromatic amines at room temperature gave 3 in low yields.