Method for the formation of nitrogen-nitrogen bonds | Poster Board #1836

Molecules containing nitrogen-nitrogen bonds have shown promising biological activity, however, these naturally occurring molecules are extremely rare. The current method to synthesize molecules with these bonds uses hydrazine or its derivatives, which contain a preformed nitrogen-nitrogen bond. Functional groups are then added to these molecules to produce the desired products with a nitrogen-nitrogen bond. However, hydrazine is unsafe for undergraduate research and this synthesis process is linear, which can result in a lower yield. The proposed method for a nitrogen-nitrogen bond forming reaction is a bimolecular nucleophilic substitution, reacting a nucleophilic nitrogen and an electrophilic nitrogen with an attached leaving group. This reaction utilizes safer starting materials and convergent synthesis, which should result in a higher yield. Thus far, promising results have been seen for some reactants according to H¹ NMR and HPLC. Current testing is focused on reproducibility, effectiveness across multiple reactants, and analysis with GC/MS.