Nef isocyanide reaction

The Nef isocyanide reaction is an addition reaction that takes place between isocyanides and acyl chlorides to form imidoyl chloride products, a process first discovered by John Ulrich Nef.

[1][2] The product imidoyl chloride can be hydrolyzed to give the amide, trapped with other nucleophiles, or undergo halide abstraction with silver salts to form an acyl nitrilium intermediate.

[3] The reaction is of some theoretical interest, as kinetic measurements[4] and DFT studies[5] have indicated that the addition occurs in one step, without the intermediacy of a tetrahedral intermediate that is commonly proposed for carbonyl addition reactions.