Some fluoroquinolones were found to be the highly efficient ligands for Heck reaction. Iodobenzene, bromobenzene and their derivatives reacted smoothly with n-butyl acrylate or styrene under phosphine-free reaction conditions in the presence of palladium acetate and fluoroquinolones. The effect of ligands, amount of catalyst, bases and solvent on the yield of the desired product was studied by using the reaction of 4-bromobenzonitrile with n-butyl acrylate as a model reaction. The results showed that the optimized reaction condition involved norfloxacin (0.2 mol%) as ligand, Pd(OAc)2 (0.1 mol%) as palladium source, K2CO3 as base, and DMA as solvent. For the reactions of aryl iodides and bromides with n-butyl acrylate or styrene, good to excellent yields of the corresponding Heck reaction products were obtained under the optimized reaction conditions.

Key words: fluoroquinolone, Heck reaction, Pd catalyst