Tetraethylene glycol promoted two-step, one-pot rapid synthesis of indole-3-[1-11C]acetic acid

[Display omitted] An operationally friendly, two-step, one-pot process has been developed for the rapid synthesis of carbon-11 labeled indole-3-acetic acid ([11C]IAA or [11C]auxin). By replacing an aprotic polar solvent with tetraethylene glycol, nucleophilic [11C]cyanation and alkaline hydrolysis reactions were performed consecutively in a single pot without a time-consuming intermediate purification step. The entire production time for this updated procedure is 55min, which dramatically simplifies the entire synthesis and reduces the starting radioactivity required for a whole plant imaging study.