stygian - 18-4-2006 at 09:47
Dont know if this should go in here or organic, but..
Assume you react acetone in a leuckart-style manner, using formamide or whatnot, stopping at the formylimine derivative (no hydrolysis). Foregoing
LiAlH4, what reducing agents might be able to hydrogenate the C=N and the C=O in one fell swoop?
leu - 18-4-2006 at 18:41
You will need a pressure vessel to carry out a leuckart reaction using formamide with acetone, as acetone is a vapor at the temperatures that a
Leuckart reaction occurs at atmospheric pressure 
One might be able to use an
alternative such as CTH or catalytic hydrogenation, but LAH is what was used in the published papers 
Quieraña - 17-2-2020 at 08:43
Urushibara or raney nickel under pressure, h2. Na cyanoborohydride, borohydride, alanes, silanes, boranes, zinc et acid, pyridine, perhaps an alkali
and an alcohol. Im going by memory but the nickel method sticks out as most plausible, moneywise. Raney requires melting aluminum w nickel metal,
then using this to make raney nickel proper in situ.
[Edited on 17-2-2020 by Quieraña]