Highly Efficient Al-Catalyzed Alcohol Oxidation via Oppenauer Reaction

Significance

This publication presents an extremely simple, selective and versatile method for the oxidation of alcohols to carbonyl compounds, based on Oppenauer chemistry. Catalytic amounts of AlMe₃ in toluene (a commercial reagent) are used along with quite inexpensive m-nitrobenz­aldehyde as a stoichiometric oxidant. A great variety of alcohols, including sterically hindered, allylic, propargylic and others were successfully subjected to oxidation by this method. This protocol is one of the most versatile and robust methods for the alcohol oxidation, reported to date.