Khadije Ghabdian, - Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Sciences, Neyshabur Branch, Islamic Azad University, P.O. Box ۹۳۱۸۸۱۳‐۶۳۹, Neyshabur, Iran
Alireza Motavalizadehkakhky - Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Sciences, Neyshabur Branch, Islamic Azad University, P.O. Box ۹۳۱۸۸۱۳‐۶۳۹, Neyshabur, Iran
Rahele Zhiani - Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Sciences, Neyshabur Branch, Islamic Azad University, P.O. Box ۹۳۱۸۸۱۳‐۶۳۹, Neyshabur, Iran

Amides and organic esters show a significant family of intermediates commonly used in the synthesis of industrial chemicals, medicines, cosmetics and food additives. Acetylation is one of the most applicable, beneficial and essential reaction in organic chemistry setting chemists to introduce reagents for this reaction. The protection of alcohols and phenols is one of the most widely used reactions in organic synthesis and is normally gained by acylation with anhydrides or acyl chlorides in the presence of tertiary amine bases like either triethylamine or pyridine,1 Lewis or protonic acids2 and solid acids.3 Some of the reported methods for the acetylation of alcohols suffer from one or more drawback such as toxicity, cost, drastic reaction conditions, hygroscopicity, thermal stability, and the explosiveness of reagents.4 Pyridine is a popular catalyst for the acetylation of alcohols using acetic anhydride, however it is toxic, has a bad smell and its high boiling point makes its removal after the reaction hard. Given those drawbacks, new, efficient, and eco-friendly methods are still in demand. Herein, we wish to report a mild, and efficient protocol for acetylation of alcohols and phenols using acetic anhydrides in the presence of Fe2O3-nano as catalyst (Fig.1).

Acetylation, Alcohol, Phenol, Acetic anhydride, Nano-sized Fe2O3