Acetylacetone hydrogen bonding

Any doubt about the existence of individual tautomers is now long past some tautomers can be crystallized separately (desmotropy), and others can be observed simultaneously in the same crystal (Section V,D,2) in summary, tautomers are not intrinsically different from isomers. Maybe it is worth mentioning that even two identical tautomers can differ. This is the case for the two intramolecular hydrogen-bonded (IMHB) enol tautomers of acetylacetone and for many NH-azoles they correspond to a doublewell profile for the proton transfer with both wells having the same energy (autotrope). 

Hydrogen bond formation also leads to differences in chemical properties. For example, the enoli-zation reaction of 2,4-pentadione (acetylacetone) is assisted by the formation of an intramolecular hydrogen bond ... 

In the calculations of the energy of hydration of metal complexes in the inner coordination sphere, one must consider hydrogen bond formation between the first-shell water molecules and those in bulk water, which leads to chains of hydrogen-bonded water molecules. Such hydrogen-bonded chains of ethanol molecules attached to the central metal ion have been found as a result of DFT B3LYP calculations on ethanol adducts to nickel acetylacetonate, where the calculated energy of hydrogen bonds correlated well with experimental data [90]. 

Hydrogen bonds connecting different molecules are termed intermolecular, and when they connect groups within the same molecule they are called intramolecular. A simple example of an intramolecular hydrogen bond is seen in the enol form of acetylacetone (see Section 10.1). Carboxylic acids... 

Fig. 5 Optimized structures (B3LYP/6-31G(d)) of the stationary points located for the proton transfer between the thiourea derived catalyst and the enol form of acetylacetone. Bond distances characteristic for hydrogen bonds are given in Angstrom, bonds broken or formed are shown in red...

Figure 6.26 Multiple hydrogen-bonding tertiary amine-functionalized thioureas screened in the asymmetric Michael reaction between trans-P-nitrostyrene and acetylacetone at 10mol% loading.

Free ligands have been studied in order to obtain an insight into their structure, both in solution and in the solid state, and for comparison with their metal complexes. H NMR spectroscopy has been used to investigate the keto-enol equilibrium and the nature of the hydrogen bonds. In the case of optically active Schiff bases UV and CD spectra provided information about structure in solution. The Schiff bases that have been most widely examined are derivatives of acetylacetone, salicyl-aldehyde and hydroxymethylenecamphor, whose prototypes with en are shown in Figure 13. 

Some ketones such as /3-dicarbonyls contain substantial amounts of the enol at equilibrium. For example, acetylacetone in aqueous solutions contains 13% of 4-hydroxypent-3-en-2-one, which is stabilized both by an intramolecular hydrogen bond and the inductive effect of the remaining carbonyl group.17 When bromine is added to such a solution, a portion is initially consumed very rapidly by the enol that is already present at equilibrium. The ketone remaining after consumption of the enol reacts more slowly via rate-determining enolization. The slow consumption of bromine is readily measured by optical absorption. In acidic solutions containing a large excess of the ketone the slow reaction follows a zero-order rate law the rate is independent of bromine concentration, because any enol formed is rapidly trapped by bromine (Scheme 1). In this case, the amount of enol present at equilibrium may be determined as the difference between the amount of bromine added and that determined by extrapolation of the observed rate law to time zero, as is shown schematically in Fig. 2. 

The keto-enol equilibrium of the 1,3-diketones has been the subject of intensive studies using various physical techniques and theoretical calculations [78-80], Recently, X-ray crystal analysis of acetylacetone (83) was carried out at 110 K, and it was found that it exists as an equilibrium mixture of the two enol forms 83b and 83c [81]. Room-temperature studies show an acetylacetone molecule with the enolic H-atom centrally positioned, which can be attributed to the dynamically averaged structure 83d. Application of a crystal engineering technique showed that a 1 1 inclusion complex of83 can be formed with l,l/-binaphthyl-2,2/-dicarboxylic acid in which the enol form is stabilized by a notably short intramolecular hydrogen bond [82],... 

Ordinarily we do not write the enol form of acetone or the keto form of phenol, although minuscule amounts do exist at equilibrium. But both forms of acetylacetone are seen in the NMR spectrum because equilibration is slow enough on the NMR scale and the enol form is stabilized by intramolecular hydrogen bonding. The enol form of acetone and the keto form of phenol are not thus stabilized furthermore, the aro-... 

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