Potassium Hydroxide‐Catalyzed Chemoselective Reduction of Cyclic Imides with Hydrosilanes: Synthesis of ω‐Hydroxylactams and Lactams

Potassium hydroxide‐catalyzed hydrosilylation exhibits excellent activity and chemoselectivity for the reduction of cyclic imides under mild reaction conditions. The chemoselectivity of the reduction system may be readily tuned by changing the identity and stoichiometry of the hydrosilanes: a polymethylhydrosiloxane (PMHS)/potassium hydroxide reduction system resulted in the reduction of various cyclic imides to the corresponding ω‐hydroxylactams in 70–94% yield, while the diphenylsilane (Ph₂SiH₂)/potassium hydroxide reduction system selectively afforded the aryl lactams in 33–95% yield. These catalytic protocols tolerate diverse functional groups and are easy to scale up.