Electron Transfer to and from Diazo Compounds Ion Radicals

3 Electron Transfer to and from Diazo Compounds Ion Radicals 

There are several aspects of electron transfer reactions to and from diazo compounds First, the processes in an electrochemical cell, in particular those taking place at the surfaces of the cathode and the anode second, the structure of the intermediates and final products obtained in electrochemical processes third, reactions of diazo compounds carried out with inorganic and organic reduction or oxidation reagents. 

The two types of investigations mentioned first are clearly within the domain of physical chemists and the last is a subject in which synthetic organic chemists are interested. It is, however, surprising that joint investigations covering two or all three aspects are relatively rare. 

We will discuss the investigations that are based on electrochemical techniques, including their mechanisms and products (as far as they are reliably known), in this section and concentrate in Section 9.4 on reactions without that technique but using 

It is appropriate to start the discussion on electron-transfer processes to and from diazo compounds with polarographic results on electron additions to a-diazo ketones. For such a reaction one expects the formation of a diazo anion radical, in which the negative charge is localized mainly on the O-atom and to give diazenyl radical character to the diazo group (9.51). 

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