Carbocations resonance stability

Structures 4 and 5 resembles 1° carbocations and yet the allyl cation is more stable than a 2° carbocation => resonance stabilization. 

In the following example, H30 is used to represent acidic water (which is almost all water, not H30 ). The pi bond is protonated to form a carbocation, resonance-stabilized by the phenyl. Water adds equally to either carbocation face to give a 1 1 mix of enantiomers of the protonated alcohol, which water then deprotonates to give the product. 

There are two major limitations on Friedel-Crafts alkylations. The first is that it is practical only with stable carbocations, such as 3° carbocations, resonance-stabilized car-bocations, or 2° carbocations that cannot undergo rearrangement (Section 5.4). Primary carbocations will undergo rearrangement, resulting in multiple products as well as bonding of the benzene ring to unexpected carbons in the former haloalkane. 

Both substrates are primary bromides. The reaction of methanol, a neutral nucleophile, with I will tend to occur by an Sj 2 allylic carbocation. Resonance stabilization enhances the rate of its formation in an Sj l process. No such stabilization can occur in the reaction of I. 

Some fundamental structure-stability relationships can be employed to illustrate the use of resonance concepts. The allyl cation is known to be a particularly stable carbocation. This stability can be understood by recognizing that the positive charge is delocalized between two carbon atoms, as represented by the two equivalent resonance structures. The delocalization imposes a structural requirement. The p orbitals on the three contiguous carbon atoms must all be aligned in the same direction to permit electron delocalization. As a result, there is an energy barrier to rotation about the carbon-carbon... 

We saw in Section 6.9 that the stability order of alkyl carbocations is 3° > 2° > 1° > —CH3. To this list we must also add the resonance-stabilized allvl and benzyl cations. Just as allylic radicals are unusually stable because the... 

Because of resonance stabilization, a primary allylic or benzylic carbocation is about as stable as a secondary alkyl carbocation and a secondary allylic or benzylic carbocation is about as stable as a tertiary alkyl carbocation. This stability order of carbocations is the same as the order of S l reactivity for alkyl halides and tosylates. 

Conjugated dienes undergo several reactions not observed for nonconjugated dienes. One is the 1,4-addition of electrophiles. When a conjugated diene is treated with an electrophile such as HCl, 1,2- and 1,4-addition products are formed. Both are formed from the same resonance-stabilized allylic carbocation intermediate and are produced in varying amounts depending on the reaction conditions. The L,2 adduct is usually formed faster and is said to be the product of kinetic control. The 1,4 adduct is usually more stable and is said to be the product of thermodynamic control. 

An example of a biological Friedel-Crafts reaction occurs during the biosynthesis of phylloquinone, or vitamin Kl( the human blood-clotting factor. Phylloquinone is formed by reaction of 1,4-dihydroxynaphthoic acid with phytyl diphosphate. Phytyl diphosphate first dissociates to a resonance-stabilized allylic carbocation, which then substitutes onto the aromatic ring in the typical way. Several further transformations lead to phylloquinone (Figure 16.10). 

An electrophilic aromatic substitution reaction takes place in two steps—initial reaction of an electrophile, E+, with the aromatic ring, followed by loss of H+ from the resonance-stabilized carbocation intermediate to regenerate the aromatic ring. 

When a substituent is able to resonantly stabilize the positive charge of the ionic intermediate, there is no bromine bridging and the intermediate is an open P-bromocarbocation. These carbocations have been shown to occur in the bromination of a-methylstilbenes (ref. 9), 1 and 2, and of a variety of enol ethers (ref. 10) and acetates (ref. 11). 

The stabilities of most other stable carbocations can also be attributed to resonance. Among these are the tropylium, cyclopropenium, and other aromatic cations discussed in Chapter 2. Where resonance stability is completely lacking, as in the phenyl (CeH ) or vinyl cations, the ion, if formed at all, is usually very short lived. Neither the vinyl nor the phenyl cation has as yet been prepared as a stable species in solution. ... 

In the interaction of a pair of atomic orbitals, two electrons form a bond and four electrons form no bond (Sect. 1.1). The snbstitnted carbocations are stabilized by the electron delocalization (hyperconjngation and resonance) through the interaction of the doubly occupied orbitals on the snbstitnents with the vacant p-orbital on the cation center. The exchange repulsion (Sect. 1.5) is cansed by four electrons. Now... 

PROBLEMS For each compound below, determine whether the LG leaving would form a resonance-stabilized carbocation. If you are not sure, try to draw resonance strnctnres of the carbocation you would get if the leaving group is expelled. 

We consider the relatively high pKA values of 6-8 to be typical value for a cation-quinone methide equilibrium. The formation of a resonance-stabilized aromatic carbocation is one reason for these high pKA values. Another reason is the high energy of the quinone methide. The thermodynamic cycle shown in... 

In step 1, a proton adds to one of the terminal carbon atoms of 1,3-butadiene to form the more stable carbocation => a resonance stabilized allylic cation, i) Addition to one of the inner carbon atoms would have produced a much less 1 ° cation, one that could not be stabilized by resonance. 

The results of ab initio calculations provide evidence that Me2NC(S)-[14+] is stabilized by resonance electron donation from the a-thioamide group (A, Scheme 12) and by covalent bridging of sulfur to the benzylic carbon (B, Scheme 12).96 Direct resonance stabilization of the carbocation will increase the barrier to the nucleophile addition reaction, because of the requirement for the relatively large fractional loss of the stabilizing resonance interaction (A, Scheme 12) at the transition state for nucleophile addition to a-substituted benzyl carbocations.8,13,28 91-93 If the solvent adds exclusively to an open carbocation that is the minor species in a mixture of open and closed ions, then... 

There is also substantial stabilization of [4+] by electron delocalization from the cyclic a-vinyl group. This is shown by a comparison of the thermodynamic driving force (p Tr lies between —7.8 and —8.5) and absolute rate constant (ks = 1 -6 x 107 s 1) for the reaction of [4+] in 25% acetonitrile in water with the corresponding parameters for reaction of the resonance-stabilized l-(4-methoxyphenyl)ethyl carbocation in water (p Tr = — 9.4and s= 1 x 108 s Table 5). 

Estimating stability it is possible to apply criteria commonly used in organic chemistry. Tertiary alkyl carbocation is more stable than the secondary one which is in its turn more stable than the primary one. For the carbon ions of this type the row of the stability is reversed. Allyl and benzyl cations are stable due to the resonance stabilization. The latter having four resonance structures may rearrange to be energetically favorable in the gas phase tropilium cation possessing seven resonance forms (Scheme 5.3). 

In general, the greater the resonance and hyper-conjugation the greater is the stability of carbocation. The stability also depends on the field strengths. The following examples illustrate this point. 

One factor that increases the stability of the bridged ion is the nature of the addendum and in this respect the order is I > Br > Cl > F. This is why with iodine we always get the trans addition and the order has been established experimentally. But where the addendum is not an iodine atom and the classical carbocation is stabilized by resonance, then cis addition takes up which may later on by rearrangement give the trans isomer. It has also been formed that the nature of the solvent also affects the amounts of cis and trans products. 

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