Carbanions Grignard reagents

In addition to diazonium salts, there are many other species that are able, once electrochemicaUy activated, to modify the surface with aromatics, unsaturated and saturated groups. These surface modifications can be achieved by (i) oxidation (amines, hydrazines, alcohols, carboxylates, carbamates, carbanions, Grignard reagents) (ii) reduction, some being closely related to diazonium salts (iodoniums, sulfonium) and other different species (vinylics, alkyl halide) (iii) spontaneously, chemically or pho-tochemically (alcenes, azides, peroxides). Note that electrochemical oxidation methods can be applied only to the materials that can withstand quite positive potentials such as carbon or Pt. This section will describe these modifications [357]. 

Often the precursor is not defined completely but rather its chemical nature is empha sized by writing it as a species to which it is equivalent for synthetic purposes Thus a Grignard reagent or an organolithium reagent might be considered synthetically equiva lent to a carbanion... 

Step 4 Since a Grignard reagent may be considered as synthetically equivalent to a carbanion this suggests the synthesis shown... 

Sodium borohydride and lithium aluminum hydride react with carbonyl compounds in much the same way that Grignard reagents do except that they function as hydride donors rather than as carbanion sources Figure 15 2 outlines the general mechanism for the sodium borohydride reduction of an aldehyde or ketone (R2C=0) Two points are especially important about this process... 

You have already had considerable experience with carbanionic compounds and their applications in synthetic organic chemistry The first was acetyhde ion m Chapter 9 followed m Chapter 14 by organometallic compounds—Grignard reagents for example—that act as sources of negatively polarized carbon In Chapter 18 you learned that enolate ions—reactive intermediates generated from aldehydes and ketones—are nucleophilic and that this property can be used to advantage as a method for carbon-carbon bond formation... 

Carbanions ia the form of phenyllithium, sodium naphthalene complex, sodium acetyHde, or aromatic Grignard reagents react with alkyl sulfates to give a C-alkyl product (30—33). Grignard reagents require two moles of dimethyl sulfate for complete reaction. 

All that has been said in this section applies with equal force to the use of organo-lithium reagents in the synthesis of alcohols. Grignard reagents are one source of nucleophilic carbon organolithium reagents are another. Both have substantial carbanionic char acter in their- car bon-metal bonds and undergo the same kind of reaction with aldehydes and ketones. 

Carboxylation (Section 19.11) In the preparation of a carboxylic acid, the reaction of a carbanion with carbon dioxide. Typically, the carbanion source is a Grignard reagent. 

As with the reduction of carbonyl compounds discussed in the previous section, we ll defer a detailed treatment of the mechanism of Grignard reactions until Chapter 19. For the moment, it s sufficient to note that Grignard reagents act as nucleophilic carbon anions, or carbanions ( R ), and that the addition of a Grignard reagent to a carbonyl compound is analogous to the addition of hydride ion. The intermediate is an alkoxide ion, which is protonated by addition of F O"1 in a second step. 

We saw in Section 17.5 that treatment of an aldehyde or ketone with a Grignard reagent, RMgX, yields an alcohol by nucleophilic addition of a carbon anion, or carbanion. A carbon-magnesium bond is strongly polarized, so a Grignard reagent reacts for all practical purposes as R - +MgX. 

There are, of course, no Grignard reagents inside living cells, but there are other types of stabilized carbanions that are often carboxylated. One of the... 

Reductive Dimerization2 5,6 can be competitive with the addition of Grignard reagents to the C —N double bond of nonenolizable imines, especially with increasing size and branching of the carbanion,... 

The oxidative dimerization of the anion of methyl phenyl sulfone (from a Grignard reagent) in ethereal solution in the presence of cupric chloride in 5% yield has been reported47. Despite the reported48 poor stability of the a-sulfonyl C-centered radicals, Julia and coworkers49 provoked the dimerization (in 13 to 56% yields) of the lithiated carbanion of alkyl phenyl sulfones using cupric salts as oxidants. The best results are obtained with cupric triflates in THF-isobutyronitrile medium (56% yield for R = H). For allyl phenyl sulfones the coupling in the 3-3 mode is predominant. 

The latter reagent also methylates certain heterocyclic compounds (e.g., quinoline) and certain fused aromatic compounds (e.g., anthracene, phenanthrene). The reactions with the sulfur carbanions are especially useful, since none of these substrates can be methylated by the Friedel-Crafts procedure (11-12). It has been reported that aromatic nitro compounds can also be alkylated, not only with methyl but with other alkyl and substituted alkyl groups as well, in ortho and para positions, by treatment with an alkyllithium compound (or, with lower yields, a Grignard reagent), followed by an oxidizing agent such as Bra or DDQ (P- 1511). 

Addition of a masked Grignard reagent to an aldehyde or ketone From aromatic aldehydes and carbanions Bimolecular reduction of aldehydes or ketones... 

Initiation presumably involves metal alkyls as the primary source of carbanions. These are immediately available from the Grignard reagents, organosodium compounds, or sodium amide used as catalysts when the alkali metal itself or its solution in liquid ammonia is used, addition to the monomer may precede actual initiation. ... 

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