Alkenes reactivity with carbenes

The reactivities of carbenes toward alkenes have been correlated with the inductive and resonance effects of the carbene substituents, log k — a Eat + fcEaR+ + c.m Analogous correlations cannot be obtained for the reaction rates of carbenes with alcohols, neither with the substituent parameters used by Moss,109 nor with related sets.110 In particular, the substituent parameters do not describe the strong, rate-enhancing effect of aryl groups. For a detailed analysis, see the discussion of proton affinities (Section V.A). 

The reactivity of heterocyclic systems with carbenes, generated under phase-transfer catalytic conditions, has been reviewed for the period up to 1983 [1]. Most unsaturated non-heteroaromatic systems react with carbenes in the manner expected of alkenes, amines, amides, ketones, etc. (see Sections 7.3,7.5 and 7.6). 

Cycloreversion of four-membered metallacycles is the most common method for the preparation of high-valent titanium [26,27,31,407,599-606] and zirconium [599,601] carbene complexes. These are usually very reactive, nucleophilic carbene complexes, with a strong tendency to undergo C-H insertion reactions or [2 -F 2] cycloadditions to alkenes or carbonyl compounds (see Section 3.2.3). Figure 3.31 shows examples of the generation of titanium and zirconium carbene complexes by [2 + 2] cycloreversion. 

Note that despite the death of the carbene-alkene complex in the study of benzylchlorocarbene (53) (see above), benzene is able to modulate the intramolecular reactivity of ferf-butylcarbene. ° Some sort of complex must be involved here. Benzene complexes with carbenes have been proposed before. Kahn and Goodman found a transient species on photolysis of diazomethane in benzene, and attributed it to a complex. Moss et al. found that benzene modulated the ratio of intramolecular rearrangement to intermolecular addition for three different carbenes (53), chloropropylcarbene, and chlorocyclopropylcarbene, and proposed that a carbene-benzene complex 70 favored the intramolecular rearrangement (Scheme 7.31). Their proposal was bolstered by ab initio calculations that found such stable complexes for CCI2 and CH3CCI. 

Dimetallocycles have been discovered which exhibit high reactivity with respect to carbon-carbon bond-making and -breaking processes. They allow the synthesis of a variety of simple but important hydrocarbon ligands bridging a dinuclear metal centre. y-Carbene complexes are readily available by several routes and their reactions have implications for both alkyne polymerisation and alkene metathesis. A substantial chemistry of organic species co-ordinated at dinuclear metal centres is in prospect, with significance for metal surface chemistry and catalysis. 

The reactions of P-halophospha-alkenes with carbenes provide a new route to 1-chloro-lH-phosphirines (181). Such compounds are highly reactive, and a study of nucleophilic displacement reactions at phosphorus has been facilitated by preparation of the related P-W(CO)5 complexes.The first pentacoordinate systems derived from phosphirenes, (182), have been formed in the reactions of P-halo- or P-cyano-phosphirenes with tetrachloro-o-quinone. Evidence has been presented for the rearrangement of P-chlorophosphirenium ions (183) to the vinylphosphenium ions (184)... 

The formation of reactive intermediates provides possible opportunities for new reaction design. An attractive highly reactive intermediate, carbenes, which demonstrate numerous useful synthetic pathways, most notably by addition to alkenes and alkynes and also insertion into X-H bonds, where X is both carbon and heteroatoms, suffers from problems associated with their accessibility. Undoubtedly, the most useful class of precursor is the diazo compounds, whose safety problems restrict their use. For the specific case of vinylidenes, an attractive possibility is a terminal alkyne which is isomeric with a vinylidene. Although the thermolysis appears to effect this transformation (Equation 1.1, path a), the extraordinarily high temperatures required make the prospect of a transition metal-catalyzed version (Equation 1.1, path b) attractive. The early studies of Werner [6] using Rh and Bruce and co-workers [7] using Ru proved the facility with which such species would form however, the studies focused on the formation and isolation of the vinylidene-metal complexes and their stoichiometric reactions. 

Carbenoids can be defined as Intermediates which exhibit reactions qualitatively similar to those of carbenes without necessarily being free divalent carbon species . Usually, the carbene is associated with a metal species. It is difficult to distinguish between a carbene and a carbenoid methods used include reactivity with alkenes and a study of the stereochemistry of reaction of the carbene(oid). A recent studyhas shown that the p value for the reactions of the alkylidene carbene derived from l-diazo-2-methyl-l-propene... 

The reactivity of carbene-metal complexes, amongst others the reactivity with respect to alkenes and alkynes, has been reviewed by Dotz Just like free carbenes the coordinated carbenes add to triple bonds to give cyclopropene derivatives. Other reaction products, however, are also possible. For instance, the carbene ligand of chromium complex 23 reacts with diphenylacetylene to a mixture of products, including naphthalene derivative 24 and furan derivative 25 (equation 18). A carbonyl ligand has participated. Molecular orbital calculations by Hofmann and Hammerle " on this system reveal that the reaction would pass through an y-vinylcarbene type of complex (26) instead of through a planar chromacyclobutene 27. The subsequent steps to yield either phenol or furan could involve vinylketene 28, but this still is a matter of debate. Similar, but more selective, furan syntheses have been observed for carbene complexes based on iron and cobalt. ... 

Carbene Generation.—One of the best investigated areas of PTC application is the generation of dihalocarbenes in a two-phase system of haloform and aqueous sodium hydroxide (Scheme 6), catalysed often by benzyltriethylammonium chloride, and earlier work has been fully surveyed.The substrate for reaction with the carbene can be present in the organic phase, and, for example, cyclopropanes are produced by insertion into any alkenes present (Equation 6). Even normally poor substrates show good reactivity towards carbenes generated under these conditions... 

The selectivity of reaction of alkenes with carbenes (produced by a-eliminations using metal alkoxides), in the presence or absence of crown compounds, has been used as a probe for carbenoid character, since in the former case carbenes are assumed to be formed free of any interactions with metal ions. The ambident carbanion of ethyl acetoacetate, as its sodium salt in THF solution, not only shows enhanced reactivity in the presence of complexing agents for the sodium ion, but also an increase in 0-alkylation with respect to C-alkylation. ... 

Carbenes are highly reactive intermediates that cannot be isolated, so they are generated in the presence of a selected reactant. When dichlorocarbene forms in the presence of an alkene, the electrophilic carbene reacts with the double bond of the alkene to form a cyclopropane. 

Into the previously reported transition-metal catalyzed intermolecular hydroalk-oxylations of alkenes, gold catalysts showed to be the most active catalysts, with divergent reactivity with respect to PtCl2, leading to the formation of aUylethers [156]. Opposite to monosubstituted allenes, disubstituted aUenes yield no aliphatic acetals. Deuteration studies support the hypothesis of a zwitterionic Pt carbene as... 

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