Facile one-pot synthesis of novel imidates as multifunctional organic fluorescent materials†

Imidates have enormous applications in the synthesis of natural products and nitrogen-containing heterocyclic compounds, as well as in drug development. However, there is currently a lack of green and efficient synthesis methods for imidate compounds. We present a novel one-pot synthesis of multifunctional organic fluorescent imidates from quinolinium salt derivatives, nitrosoarenes and alcohols. This method has the advantages of operational simplicity, mild reaction conditions, metal-free catalysis, a wide substrate scope (43 examples) and excellent isolated yields (up to 93%). Meanwhile, quinolinium-imidates exhibit good fluorescence intensity and excellent chemical stability, which makes them suitable for application in living cells, and in particular, imidate can target the endoplasmic reticulum with high selectivity.