Carboxylate ions, aryl reactions

Spontaneous decarboxylations of carboxylate ions and hydrolyses of aryl phosphate dianions and aryl sulfate monoanions are much faster in organic solvents than in water (Thomson, 1970 Kemp and Paul, 1970 Bunton et al., 1967 Kirby and Varvoglis, 1967). This solvent effect is consistent with the Hughes-Ingold qualitative solvent theory because these reactions involve dispersion of charge in forming the transition state. 

Electrolysis of carboxylate ions, which results in decarboxylation and combination of the resulting radicals, is called the Kolbe reaction. 30 It is used to prepare symmetrical RR, where R is straight- or branched-chained, except that little or no yield is obtained when there is a branching. The reaction is not successful for R = aryl. Many functional groups... 

There has been a summary of the use of insertion reactions of arynes into a-bonds to prepare nrt/io-disubs tituted arenes. A key to the success of these processes is the ability to generate benzyne under mild conditions by the reaction of readily available o-(trimethylsilyl)phenyl triflate with fluoride ions.61 Reaction of amines and their derivatives with benzynes generated in this way has been shown to be an efficient method for the production of N-arylated derivatives, as illustrated in Scheme 8. The method also works well in the O-arylation reactions of phenols and carboxylic acids 62... 

Although nitriles lack an acyl group, they are considered acid derivatives because they hydrolyze to carboxylic acids. Nitriles are frequently made from carboxylic acids (with the same number of carbons) by conversion to primary amides followed by dehydration. They are also made from primary alkyl halides and tosylates (adding one carbon) by nucleophilic substitution with cyanide ion. Aryl cyanides can be made by the Sandmeyer reaction of an aryldiazonium salt with cuprous cyanide. a-Hydroxynitriles (cyanohydrins) are made by the reaction of ketones and aldehydes with HCN. 

The possibilities for the formation of carbon—carbon bonds involving aromatic compounds have been enormously enhanced by the use of transition metal catalysts, and this area has been the subject of several reviews. Some of these concentrate on the applications of specific metals, and there have been surveys of the use of compounds of silver, copper and nickel,mthenium, and palladium in catalysis. The metalation of carbon-hydrogen bonds, preceding functionalization, may be aided by carboxylate ions, and this subject has also been reviewed. There is evidence here for concerted base-assisted deprotonation as shown in (10). In the carboxylate-assisted reaction of aryl ketimines with alkyl halides, a ruthenium-bonded intermediate (11) has been proposed, which subsequently adds the alkyl halide. " ... 

Among the nucleophiles which can be introduced by this reaction are carboxylate ions, ° phthalimide anions,alkoxide ions, and acetylide groups.In many of these reactions there is competitive reduction of the aryl halide to the arene. 

The reaction is less selective than the related benzoylation reaction (/pMe = 30.2, cf. 626), thereby indicating a greater charge on the electrophile this is in complete agreement with the greater ease of nuclophilic substitution of sulphonic acids and derivatives compared to carboxylic acids and derivatives and may be rationalized from a consideration of resonance structures. The effect of substituents on the reactivity of the sulphonyl chloride follows from the effect of stabilizing the aryl-sulphonium ion formed in the ionisation step (81) or from the effect on the preequilibrium step (79). 

The above results pertain to reactions in solution. In the gas phase reactions can take a different course, as illustrated by the reaction of carboxylic esters with MeO, which in the gas phase was shown to take place only by the Bal2 mech-anism, ° even with aryl esters, ° where this means that an Sn2 mechanism takes place at an aryl substrate. However, when the gas-phase reaction of aryl esters was carried out with MeO ions, each of which was solvated with a single molecule of MeOH or H2O, the Bac2 mechanism was observed. 

A concerted elimination-cyclization mechansim, involving a sulfenyl halide in a 1,3-butadiene-1-thio system, is the most probable mechanism for the formation of benzo[6 Jthiophenes from cinnamic acids or 4-aryl-2-butanones by treatment with thionyl chloride. The reactions shown in Scheme 5 have been carefully worked out, and the intermediates isolated (75JOC3037). The unique aspect of this synthesis is the reduction of the sulfinyl chloride (a) by thionyl chloride to form the sulfenyl chloride (b). The intermediate (b) was isolated and converted in pyridine to the 3-chlorobenzo[6]thiophene-2-carbonyl chloride in 36% yield (73TL125). The reaction is probably initiated by a sulfenyl ion attack on the aromatic ring, since it is promoted by electron-releasing groups para to the site of ring closure. For example, when X in (36) was N02, a 23% yield of (37), a mixture of 5-and 7-nitro derivatives, was obtained, but when X in (36) was OMe, a 54% yield of (37) was obtained, contaminated with some 3,4-dichloro-5-methoxybenzo[6]thiophene-2-carboxylic acid. 

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