Carbocations relative stability

One way to assess the relative stabilities of these various intermediates is to exam me electron delocalization m them using a resonance description The cyclohexadienyl cations leading to o and p mtrotoluene have tertiary carbocation character Each has a resonance form m which the positive charge resides on the carbon that bears the methyl group... 

The relative stability of the carbocation can be expressed in terms of its pir+ which is defined as... 

These data provide a thermodynamic basis for comparison of the relative stability of nonisomeric carbocations. Some representative results are shown in Table 5.2. The... 

The rates of hydration of alkenes increase dramatically with increasing alkyl substitution (see table at left). This is usually attributed to the relative stabilities of carbocations formed as intermediates in the initial (and rate-hmiting) step of the reaction, e.g., for hydration of propene. 

The stability of carbocations depends on the nature of alkyl groups attached to the positive charge. The relative stability of carbenium ions is as follows [2] with tertiary ions being the most stable ... 

Various quantitative methods have been developed to express the relative stabilities of carbocations. One of the most common of these, though useful only for relatively stable cations that are formed by ionization of alcohols in acidic solutions, is based on the equation ... 

The activation energies for the fragmentation of the carbene in CH2C12 were calculated by the B3LYP/6-31G method to be 14.6, 2.2, and —0.95 for the bicyclo[2.2.1]heptyl, bicyclo[2.2.2]octyl, and adamantyl systems, respectively. Are the product trends consistent with these computational results, which presumably reflect the relative stability of the carbocation formed by the fragmentation ... 

In practice, however, the expected racemisation—and nothing but racemisation—is rarely observed, it is almost always accompanied by some degree of inversion. The relative proportions of the two are found to depend on (a) the structure of the halide, in particular the relative stability of the carbocation to which it can give rise and (ft) the solvent, in particular on its ability as a nucleophile. The more stable the carbocation, the greater is the proportion of racemisation the more nucleophilic the solvent, the greater is the proportion of inversion. These observations become understandable if the rate-limiting SN1 ionisation follows the sequence ... 

The actual proportions of products obtained in many cases are not necessarily found to reflect the relative stabilities of the incipient carbocations, unrearranged and rearranged, however. This follows from the fact that their relative rates of reaction with the aromatic species almost certainly do not follow the order of their relative stabilities, and may well be diametrically opposed to it. Attack on the aromatic species by the first formed polarised complex may be faster than its rearrangement. The study of these rearrangements is also complicated by the fact that Lewis acids are found to be capable of rearranging both the original halides, and the final, alkylated end-products, e.g. ... 

A major feature promoting overall ipso substitution will be ease of formation of Y , and we might thus expect to see some such displacement of secondary and tertiary alkyl substituents, because of the relative stability of the resultant carbocations, R . This is found to happen in the nitration (nitrodealkylation) reactions below ... 

A bridged intermediate exactly analogous to a bromonium ion cannot be formed as H has no electron pair available, but it may be that in some cases a n complex (21) is the intermediate. We shall, however, normally write the intermediate as a carbocation, and it is the relative stability of possible, alternative, carbocations (e.g. 23 and 24) that determines the overall orientation of addition, e.g. in the addition of HBr to propene (22) under polar conditions ... 

Addition is initiated by the positively polarised end (the less electronegative halogen atom) of the unsymmetrical molecule, and a cyclic halonium ion intermediate probably results. Addition of I—Cl is particularly stereoselective (ANTI) because of the ease of formation (and relative stability compared with carbocations) of cyclic iodonium ions. With an unsymmetrical alkene, e.g. 2-methylpropene (32), the more heavily alkyl-substituted carbon will be the more carbocationic (i.e. the less bonded to Br in 33), and will therefore be attacked preferentially by the residual nucleophile, Cle. The overall orientation of addition will thus be Markownikov to yield (34) ... 

The primary factor that determines the reactivity of organic substrates in an SnI reaction is the relative stability of the carbocation that is formed. 

Antimony pentachloride is a reactive Lewis acid that can be used for Friedel-Crafts reactions and some other Lewis-acid-catalyzed reactions. The HF-SbF5 system is known as magic acid, and carbocations are stabilized in this medium.353 By using the HF-SbF5 system, alkylation of acetophenone (a relatively unreactive aromatic compound) has been achieved (Scheme 87). 

The 1.8 kcal mol 1 less favorable change in Gibbs free energy for the addition of water to [18+] to give [18]-OH in 50/50 (v/v) trifluoroethanol/water (p/CR = -11.3)104 than for addition of water to Me-[6+] in the same solvent (pATR = -12.6)13 shows that the former carbocation is stabilized relative to the alcohol. This stabilization may be the result of the smaller entropic price paid to restrict the / —CH bonds in the five-membered ring at [18+] to conformations that are favorable for hyperconjugation with the cationic carbon. 

Table 3 Relative stabilities" (in kcalmol of substituted bromonium ions and alkyl carbocations in the gas phase.11...

The behavior of the isomeric dihydronaphthalenes emphasizes the importance of the relative stabilities of carbocation intermediates in ionic hydrogenations. Treatment of 1,2-dihydronaphthalene with Et3SiH/TFA at 50-60° gives a 90% yield of tetralin after one hour. Under the same conditions, the 1,4-dihydronaphthalene isomer gives less than 5% of tetralin after 70 hours.224 This difference in reactivity is clearly related to the relatively accessible benzylic cation formed upon protonation of the 1,2-isomer compared to the less stable secondary cation formed from the 1,4-isomer.224... 

From a number of experiments it has been concluded that with short life carbocations (obtained from secondary and tertiary alkyl deviatives) inversion is generally observed. But in long life carbocation where there is spreading of the charge, the product is a racemic one, as in diphenyl methyl carbocation Ph2CHX. Therefore it also affords a means of estimating the relative stability of carbocations. 

The initiation of the cationic polymerisation of alkenes is examined in detail by means of simple thermodynamic concepts. From a consideration of the kinetic requirements it is shown that the ideal initiator will yield a stable, singly charged anion and a cation with a high reactivity towards the monomer by simple, well defined reactions. It must also be adequately soluble in the solvent of choice and for the experimental method to be used. The calculations are applied to carbocation salts as initiators and a method of predicting their relative solubilities is described. From established and predicted data for a variety of carbocation salts the position of their ion molecule equilibria and their reactivity towards alkenes are examined by means of Born-Haber cycles. This treatment established the relative stabilities of a number of anions and the reason for dityl, but not trityl salts initiating the polymerisation of isobutene. 

The difference between A obsd and caic might be due to a specific salt effect on the rate constant for solvolysis. However, this is unlikely because perchlorate ion acts to stabilize carbocations relative to neutral substrates.At high concentrations of sodium bromide, the rate-limiting step for solvolysis of 1-Br is the capture of 1 by solvent (ks Scheme 5A). Substitution of Br for CIO4 should destabilize the carbocation-like transition state for this step relative to the starting neutral substrate, and this would lead to a negative, rather than positive deviation of obsd for equations (3A) and (3B). 

Since carbocations are structurally similar to ketones, they are discussed here. Schleyer s force field incorporates carbocation parameters, and Harris is exploring their application in conformational analysis (188). The calculated angles in a series of rigid polycyclic carbocations correlated well with ketone infrared frequencies (188a). The calculated relative stabilities among various conformers of tertiary cations of methylcyclohexane, methylcycloheptane, and methyl-cyclooctane do not contradict the limited MNR observations of these species at low temperature (188b). 

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