The general procedure as highlighted by Hennessy and Buchwald was followed. An oven-dried 50 mL round-bottomed flask was equipped with a magnetic stir bar and air condenser. Palladium acetate (2 mol%), JohnPhos (4 mol%) and the chloroacetanilide substrate (5 mmol) was then charged, and the flask was evacuated and backfilled with nitrogen 3 times. Anhydrous triethylamine (1.05 mL, 10 mmol) was added, followed by anhydrous toluene (5 mL). The reaction mixture was heated at 80 °C and ran overnight, then diluted with ethyl acetate (50 mL). The mixture was filtered through a plug of celite, concentrated on a rotary evaporator, then purified by silica gel chromatography to give the oxindole product. For each case study, the starting material was purchased from J&H Chemical in 95 % purity. All other chemicals were purchased from Sigma Aldrich unless otherwise stated.