Synthesis and decarboxylation of 2,3-Dioxophenylpyrrolidine- 3-carboxylic acid etyhl ester / Julieyana Abdul Manap

There were two stage involved in this experiment. The first stage was the synthesis of the
2,3-dioxopyrrolidines and second stage was decarboxylation. In the first stage of synthesis
there were three reagents used to produce the ring systems. There were diethyl oxalate,
anisaldehyde and an amine. Different amines used were benzylamine and methylamine.
The products obtained 1-phenyl-4,5-dioxo-2-pheyl-pyrrolidine-3-carboxylic acid ethyl
ester and 1-methyl-4.5-dioxo-2-phenyl-pyrrolidine-3-carboxylic acid ethyl ester
respectively. The products were characterized using NMR. In decarboxylation, each
product from the first stage was refluxed with 10% HCl for 5 hours and extracted with
dichloromethane and ethyl acetate. After drying with anhydrous magnesium sulfate and