In the last decade, the treatment of insomnia has been supplemented by the introduction of a number of nonbenzodiazepine hypnotics including zolpidem, zopiclone and, most recently, zaleplon [1-4]. Zaleplon (N-[3-(cyanopyrazolo [1, 5-a] pyrimidin-7-yl)-phenyl]-N- ethylacetamide, 1a, Figure 1) is a new pyrazolopyrimidine hypnotic that selectively binds to the α1-GABAA receptor subunit, enhancing the function of GABA as a result of an ...