Hydrogen Peroxide → Oxycodone

Thebaine (15.94 g) was added to a 250 ml flask. Water (18 ml) was added and the mixture was stirred at room temperature. Formic acid (42 ml) was added over 3 minutes and then the mixture was cooled in an ice bath. Hydrogen peroxide (30%, 6.7 g) was added and the mixture was stirred for 1 hour. The mixture was removed from the ice bath, allowed to warm to room temperature and then heated to 48° C. for 2 hours. The mixture was transferred to a hydrogenation bottle. A 5 wt % palladium on carbon catalyst (2 g) was added and hydrogen was passed through the mixture at approximately 20 psi for 15 hours. The catalyst was removed by passing the mixture through a pad of celite and rinsing the filtered solid with water/formic acid (3:1, 8 ml). The mixture was cooled in an ice bath and 25% sodium hydroxide (109 ml) was added dropwise over 50 minutes to increase the pH to 9–10. The mixture was stirred for 1 hour and 15 minutes and the solid product was filtered, rinsed with cold water and dried under vacuum pump for 3 hours. The product was oxycodone base (14.152 g, 87.7% yield) and contained 178 ppm of the α,β-unsaturated ketone impurity, 14-hydroxycodeinone.