A 1 l, three-necked flask containing 250 g of 1-iodopropane (9 equiv.), 300 ml of 2-butanone as solvent and 142.28 g of K2CO3 (HI and H2O scavenger) was equipped with a mechanical stirring device, a 50 ml addition funnel and a reflux condenser. After the reaction vessel was purged with argon for 30 min, 8.98 g of 2-aminoethanol was added from the addition funnel. The reaction mixture was heated to reflux (approximately 90°C) with mechanical stirring (approximately 40 rev min−1) for 24 h. The reaction was kept in the dark to avoid iodide oxidation. Without cooling, the reaction mixture was filtered to remove the potassium salts. The filtrate was concentrated under vacuum, resulting in an off-white semi-solid. The crude product was dissolved in a minimum of warm methanol and recrystallized by slow addition of cold ethyl ether. After standing overnight, the product was recovered by filtration and recrystallized a second time as described above (23 g, 50% yield). The purity of the compound was checked by and .