Silica-anchored Cu(I) aminothiophenol complex: An efficient heterogeneous catalyst for synthesis of 1,4-disubstituted 1,2,3-triazoles in water

An efficient method has been developed for synthesis of 1,4-disubstituted 1,2,3-triazoles using the silica-anchored Cu(I) aminothiophenol complex [SiO2-AT-Cu(I)] as a novel heterogeneous catalyst. The prepared catalyst is characterized by the FT-IR spectroscopy, and TGA, SEM, and ICP techniques. Terminal alkynes react with aroyl bromides and sodium azide in the presence of CuI anchored on silica in water at 80°C. The reactions exclusively generate the corresponding regiospecific 1,4-disubstituted 1,2,3-triazoles in good yields. The attractive features of this method are the simple procedure, clean reaction, use of a reusable catalyst, easy workup, and performing a click reaction in water. Moreover, the catalyst can be removed from the reaction mixture by means of simple filtration, and used again for up to five runs without a remarkable loss in its activity.