Aldehyde hemiacetals, cyclic

It should be noted that PL can exist in solution as a cyclic hemlacetal, aldehyde hydrate, or free aldehyde. The cyclic hemiacetal form is predominantly found in solution (69) the fluorescence characteristics of PL listed in Table 2 therefore refer to the cyclic hemiacetal form of the vitamer. If pyridoxal occurred in the aldehyde form, the fluorescence observed should be considerably less, since the aldehyde group tends to diminish the fluorescence of aromatic systems due to its tendency to withdraw electrons from the ring structure (68,70). 

Although carbohydrates exist almost entirely as cyclic hemiacetals m aqueous solution they are m rapid equilibrium with their open chain forms and most of the reagents that react with simple aldehydes and ketones react m an analogous way with the carbonyl functional groups of carbohydrates... 

Experiments designed to clarify the situation were carried out by Wittig and Mayer (40). It was shown that changing the molar ratio of amine (diethylamine, di- -butylamine, or diisobutylamine) to -butyraldehyde from 1 1 to 2 1 did not affect the yield of enamine (53- 64%, based on the aldehyde). Contrariwise, changing the ratio of amine (morpholine, piperidine, or pyrrolidine) to n-butyraldehyde from 1 1 to 2 1 boosted the yields from 52-57 % to 80-85 %. The authors interpret these data as indicating that the cyclic amines form aminals with n-butyraldehyde, while the open-chain do not. Infrared evidence is stated as having shown that the aminal originates not from attack of excess amine on the enamine, which is stable under the conditions of the reaction, but from the N-hemiacetal (17). 

Acetal and hemiacetal groups are particularly common in carbohydrate chemistry. Glucose, for instance, is a polyhydroxy aldehyde that undergoes an internal nucleophilic addition reaction and exists primarily as a cyclic hemiacetal. 

Glycolysis is a ten-step process that begins with isomerization of glucose from its cyclic hemiacetal form to its open-chain aldehyde form—a reverse nucleophilic addition reaction. The aldehyde then undergoes tautomerixa-tion to yield an enol, which undergoes yet another tautomerization to give the ketone fructose. 

Monosaccharides normally exist as cyclic hemiacetals rather than as open-chain aldehydes or ketones. The hemiacetal linkage results from reaction of the carbonyl group with an —OH group three or four carbon atoms away. A... 

When catalyzed by acids, low molecular weight aldehydes add to each other to give cyclic acetals, the most common product being the trimer. The cyclic trimer of formaldehyde is called trioxane, and that of acetaldehyde is known as paraldehyde. Under certain conditions, it is possible to get tetramers or dimers. Aldehydes can also polymerize to linear polymers, but here a small amount of water is required to form hemiacetal groups at the ends of the chains. The linear polymer formed from formaldehyde is called paraformaldehyde. Since trimers and polymers of aldehydes are acetals, they are stable to bases but can be hydrolyzed by acids. Because formaldehyde and acetaldehyde have low boiling points, it is often convenient to use them in the form of their trimers or polymers. 

The aldehyde or ketone group of monosaccharides can undergo an intramolecular reaction with one of its own hydroxyl groups to form a cyclic, hemiacetal, or hemiketal structure, respectively (Figure 1.26). In aqueous solutions, this cyclic structure actually predominates. The open-chain aldehyde or ketone form of monosaccharides is in equilibrium with the cyclic form, but the open structure exists less than 0.5 percent of the time in aqueous environments. It is the... 

An a-hydroxy aldehyde will be oxidized relatively rapidly if another hydroxyl group in a position 7 or 5 to the carbonyl permits formation of a pseudoglycol structure by cyclic hemiacetalization. ... 

Figure 9.5 Cyclic, hemiacetal structures of D-glucose. The reaction between an alcohol and aldehyde group within an aldohexose results in the formation of a hemiacetal. The only stable ring structures are five- or six-membered. Ketohexoses and pentoses also exist as ring structures due to similar internal reactions.

The addition of an amine to the carbonyl group of an aldehyde yields—after removal of water—an aldimine (not shown see p. 178). Aldimines are intermediates in amino acid metabolism (see p. 178) and serve to bond aldehydes to amino groups in proteins (see p. 62, for example). The addition of an alcohol to the carbonyl group of an aldehyde yields a hemiacetal (R-O-C(H)OH-R). The cyclic forms of sugars are well-known examples of hemi-... 

Reaction at the C atom of nitronate salts is known with a variety of electrophiles, such as aldehydes (Henry reaction) and epoxides (191-193). Thus the incorporation of the nitro moiety and the cyclization event can be combined into a tandem sequence. Addition of the potassium salt of dinitromethane to an a-haloaldehyde affords a nitro aldol product that can then undergo intramolecular O-alkylation to provide the cyclic nitronate (208, Eq. 2.17) (59). This process also has been expanded to a-nitroacetates and unfunctionalized nitroalkanes. Other electrophiles include functionalized a-haloaldehydes (194,195), a-epoxyaldehydes (196), a-haloenones (60), and a-halosulfonium salts (197), (Chart 2.2). In the case of unsubstituted enones, it is reported that the intermediate nitronate salt can undergo formation of a hemiacetal, which can be acetylated in moderate yield (198). 

To explain the above results, glucose is assumed to exist as a cyclic hemiacetal in equilibrium with a small amount of the open-chain aldehyde. In the hemiacetal, C is chiral and two diastereomers (anomers) are possible they are called a- and jS-glucosides. The C of C=0 is always the anomeric position. Cyclic hemiacetals form when an OH and a CHO group in the same molecule can form a five- or six-membered ring that is more stable than the open chain. 

FIGURE 7-6 Formation of the two cyclic forms of D-glucose. Reaction between the aldehyde group at C-l and the hydroxyl group at C-5 forms a hemiacetal linkage, producing either of two stereoisomers, the a and fi anomers, which differ only in the stereochemistry around the hemiacetal carbon. The interconversion of a and fi anomers is called mutarotation. 

Monosaccharides commonly form internal hemiacetals or hemiketals, in which the aldehyde or ketone group joins with a hydroxyl group of the same molecule, creating a cyclic structure this can be represented as a Haworth perspective formula. The carbon atom originally found in the aldehyde or ketone group (the anomeric carbon) can assume either of two configurations, a and /3, which are interconvertible by mutarotation. In the linear form, which is in equilibrium with the cyclized forms, the anomeric carbon is easily oxidized. 

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