Preparation of 5,5′‐pyrilidene and 5,5′‐quinolidene bis‐barbituric acid derivatives

NMR reaction following experiments were used to find optimal conditions for the barbituric acid double addition to aromatic and heteroaromatic carboxaldehydes. It was established that aromatic aldehydes with electron‐donating substituents such as hydroxy, methoxy, and dimethylamino produce only the single addition barbituric acid adduct (barbituric acid benzylidenes). If these electron‐donating substituents are transformed into electron‐withdrawing substituents by virtue of protonation (NMe₂ to NHMe₂⁺) then the double barbituric acid adduct becomes the sole product of the reaction. This is also true regardless of the reaction media if strong electron‐withdrawing substituents (such as a nitro group) are present. Considering that the reactive species for nitrogen containing aromatic heterocycles are actually the conjugated acids (electron deficient molecule) only the double barbituric acid adducts are isolated. All synthetic procedures presented are applicable to multi‐gram scale preparations of double barbituric acid adducts.