Rapid microfluidic flow hydrogenation for reduction or deprotection of 18F-labeled compounds

Neil Vasdev, et al.
Chem. Commun., 2013,49, 8755-8757
DOI: 10.1039/C3CC45166F

Lead by Neil Vasdev, a collaborative group from Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital, Northeastern University, and Advion, have combined the benefits of both microfluidics and flow hydrogenation to provide facile access to previously underutilized reduction and protecting group chemistries for PET imaging applications. The rapid removal of an O-benzyl protecting group to prepare 2-[¹⁸F]fluoroquinolin-8-ol and the reduction of a nitro group in the synthesis of 4-[¹⁸F]fluoroaniline were achieved within 3 minutes.