Manganese‐Catalyzed Multicomponent Synthesis of Pyrimidines from Alcohols and Amidines

Abstract The development of catalytic reactions for synthesizing different compounds from alcohols to save fossil carbon feedstock and reduce CO 2 emissions is of high importance. Replacing rare noble metals with abundantly available 3d metals is equally important. We report a manganese‐complex‐catalyzed multicomponent synthesis of pyrimidines from amidines and up to three alcohols. Our reaction proceeds through condensation and dehydrogenation steps, permitting selective C−C and C−N bond formations. β‐Alkylation reactions are used to multiply alkylate secondary alcohols with two different primary alcohols to synthesize fully substituted pyrimidines in a one‐pot process. Our PN 5 P‐Mn‐pincer complexes efficiently catalyze this multicomponent process. A comparison of our manganese catalysts with related cobalt catalysts indicates that manganese shows a reactivity similar to that of iridium but not cobalt. This analogy could be used to develop further (de)hydrogenation reactions with manganese complexes.