Aluminum compounds, organic derivatives

Metals more electronegative than magnesium, like beryllium, zinc, cadmium and mercury, form useful reagents for specific purposes, but the metals themselves are not sufficiently active to form organic derivatives under normal laboratory conditions and are unwanted in the environment since they are toxic. Aluminum compounds are useful for industrial purposes, but their use in the laboratory is insignificant in comparison with Grignard reagents. 

Although there is a considerable organic chemistry of all of the Group IIIA metals, the organic chemistry of aluminum is by far the most extensive and important. Various organic derivatives are known, and some of them are used industrially on a large scale. Several trialkylaluminum compounds are important, as are some of the mixed alkyl halides. Table 9.3 shows physical data for some of the aluminum compounds. 

Silicon is the most plentiful electropositive element on the earth s crust, being three times as abundant as aluminum and six times as abundant as iron. Yet the only compounds of silicon which have been important to human history are those natural forms of silica and the silicate minerals which are used in the building arts and in ceramic technology. Only within the past 90 years have hydrides and organic derivatives of silicon been synthesized, and the chlorides 30 years before up to a few years ago it could be said that all these substances were still relatively unknown products of the laboratory, unimportant save for their scientific interest. The chemistry and technology of silicon continued to be dominated entirely by consideration of the inorganic silicates. 

Reactions of tin(IV) halides or organotin halides with organic derivatives of more electropositive metals provide the most important general synthetic routes to carbon-tin bonds (equation 6). The most frequently used R -M compounds are those of magnesium and lithium, with sodium, zinc, and aluminum having a more limited use. Some examples of these reactions are given in equations (7-9). 

Reaction with Organic Compounds. Aluminum is not attacked by saturated or unsaturated, aUphatic or aromatic hydrocarbons. Halogenated derivatives of hydrocarbons do not generally react with aluminum except in the presence of water, which leads to the forma tion of halogen acids. The chemical stabiUty of aluminum in the presence of alcohols is very good and stabiUty is excellent in the presence of aldehydes, ketones, and quinones. 

Lewis acids are defined as molecules that act as electron-pair acceptors. The proton is an important special case, but many other species can play an important role in the catalysis of organic reactions. The most important in organic reactions are metal cations and covalent compounds of metals. Metal cations that play prominent roles as catalysts include the alkali-metal monocations Li+, Na+, K+, Cs+, and Rb+, divalent ions such as Mg +, Ca +, and Zn, marry of the transition-metal cations, and certain lanthanides. The most commonly employed of the covalent compounds include boron trifluoride, aluminum chloride, titanium tetrachloride, and tin tetrachloride. Various other derivatives of boron, aluminum, and titanium also are employed as Lewis acid catalysts. 

Methyl-4-hydroxyquinazoline reacts with organic halides, in the presence of sodium methoxide, to give 3-substituted 2-methyl-4(3i/)-quinazolinones. The 0-acetyl derivative of 4-hydroxyquinazoline has been prepared under anhydrous conditions and gives the hydroxy compound with water or with lithium aluminum hydride. The N-3 acetyl derivative, however, is more stable and gives 3-methyl-4(31/)-quinazolinone with lithium aluminum hydride. ... 

The use of organozirconium compounds as carbanion equivalents is greatly facilitated by trans metallations to the more reactive aluminum [11,100], copper [104—106], nickel [96—98], and palladium [99] derivatives. Copper-catalyzed carbon—carbon bond-forming reactions of alkyl- and alkenylzirconocene compounds have been particularly well studied, and have found considerable application in organic synthesis [107,108]. 

The soil solution will contain numerous inorganic and organic compounds derived from the solid components making up the soil. Common compounds include oxides, particularly those of silicon, aluminum, iron, and titanium in low concentrations. These compounds move down the soil profile sometimes contributing to formations such as the spodic horizon, which can contain aluminum and iron oxides along with highly decomposed carbon. 

In the fourth and final chapter, Howard Haubenstock discusses asymmetric reduction of organic molecules. Within this general topic of wide and continuing interest, Haubenstock s chapter deals with chiral derivatives of lithium aluminum hydride, their preparation from suitable amino or hydroxy compounds, and their use in reducing carbonyl groups. Related reactions of the Meerwein-Ponndorf-Verley type or involving tri-alkylaluminum reagents are also presented. 

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