Transition metal-free NaOH-catalyzed hydration of nitriles to primary amides in NH 3 ·H 2 O–DMSO mixture

In this paper, we reported an efficient protocol for hydration of aryl(hetero) and alkyl nitriles toward primary amides with 0.1 equiv. NaOH in NH3·H2O–DMSO under mild conditions. Various substituted nitriles are smoothly converted to the corresponding amides with good to excellent isolated yields. Gram-scale reactions were also performed to produce the desired products in high yields. In addition, the excessive hydrolysis of the nitrile to form the corresponding carboxylic acid was also achieved with increasing the amount of NaOH and prolonging the reaction time.