Halides reactivity mechanism

The fact that the order of halide reactivity is Br > I > Cl > F (when the reaction is performed with KNH2 in liquid NH3) shows that the SnAt mechanism is not operating here. ... 

Secondary bromides and tosylates react with inversion of stereochemistry, as in the classical SN2 substitution reaction.21 Alkyl iodides, however, lead to racemized product. Aryl and alkenyl halides are reactive, even though the direct displacement mechanism is not feasible. With there halides the mechanism probably consists of two steps. The addition of halides to transition-metal species with low oxidation states is a common reaction in transition-metal chemistry and is called oxidative addition. An oxidative addition to the copper occurs in the first step of the mechanism, and the formal oxidation... 

Under these conditions, the order of reactivity to nucleophilic substitution changes dramatically from that observed in the Sn2 reaction, such that tertiary alkyl halides are more reactive then secondary alkyl halides, with primary alkyl halides not reacting at all. Thus a different mechanism must be involved. For example, consider the reaction of 2-iodo-2-methylpropane with water. (Following fig.). In it, the rate of reaction depends on the concentration of the alkyl halide alone and the concentration of the attacking nucleophile has no effect. Thus, the nucleophile must present if the reaction is to occur, but it does not matter whether there is one equivalent of the nucleophile or an excess. Since the reaction rate depends only on the alkyl halide, the mechanism is called the SN1 reaction, where SN stands for substitution nucleophilic and the 1 shows that the reaction is first order or unimolecular, i.e. only one of the reactants affects the reaction rate. 

Reactivity of alkyl halides in mechanism has been governed by steric factors. 

The o-keto ester 513 is formed from a bulky secondary alcohol using tricy-clohexylphosphine or triarylphosphine, but the selectivity is low[367-369]. Alkenyl bromides are less reactive than aryl halides for double carbonyla-tion[367], a-Keto amides are obtained from aryl and alkenyl bromides, but a-keto esters are not obtained by their carbonylation in alcohol[370]. A mechanism for the double carbonylation was proposed[371,372],... 

The reaction of an alcohol with a hydrogen halide is a substitution A halogen usually chlorine or bromine replaces a hydroxyl group as a substituent on carbon Calling the reaction a substitution tells us the relationship between the organic reactant and its prod uct but does not reveal the mechanism In developing a mechanistic picture for a par ticular reaction we combine some basic principles of chemical reactivity with experi mental observations to deduce the most likely sequence of steps... 

It IS important to note that although methyl and primary alcohols react with hydro gen halides by a mechanism that involves fewer steps than the corresponding reactions of secondary and tertiary alcohols fewer steps do not translate to faster reaction rates Remember the order of reactivity of alcohols with hydrogen halides is tertiary > sec ondary > primary > methyl Reaction rate is governed by the activation energy of the slowest step regardless of how many steps there are... 

Chemical reactivity and functional group transformations involving the preparation of alkyl halides from alcohols and from alkanes are the mam themes of this chapter Although the conversions of an alcohol or an alkane to an alkyl halide are both classi tied as substitutions they proceed by very different mechanisms... 

As we have seen the nucleophile attacks the substrate m the rate determining step of the Sn2 mechanism it therefore follows that the rate of substitution may vary from nucleophile to nucleophile Just as some alkyl halides are more reactive than others some nucleophiles are more reactive than others Nucleophilic strength or nucleophilicity, is a measure of how fast a Lewis base displaces a leaving group from a suitable substrate By measuring the rate at which various Lewis bases react with methyl iodide m methanol a list of then nucleophihcities relative to methanol as the standard nucleophile has been compiled It is presented m Table 8 4... 

There are alternatives to the addition-elimination mechanism for nucleophilic substitution of acyl chlorides. Certain acyl chlorides are known to react with alcohols by a dissociative mechanism in which acylium ions are intermediates. This mechanism is observed with aroyl halides having electron-releasing substituents. Other acyl halides show reactivity indicative of mixed or borderline mechanisms. The existence of the SnI-like dissociative mechanism reflects the relative stability of acylium ions. 

The reactivities of the substrate and the nucleophilic reagent change vyhen fluorine atoms are introduced into their structures This perturbation becomes more impor tant when the number of atoms of this element increases A striking example is the reactivity of alkyl halides S l and mechanisms operate when few fluorine atoms are incorporated in the aliphatic chain, but perfluoroalkyl halides are usually resistant to these classical processes However, formal substitution at carbon can arise from other mecharasms For example nucleophilic attack at chlorine, bromine, or iodine (halogenophilic reaction, occurring either by a direct electron-pair transfer or by two successive one-electron transfers) gives carbanions These intermediates can then decompose to carbenes or olefins, which react further (see equations 15 and 47) Single-electron transfer (SET) from the nucleophile to the halide can produce intermediate radicals that react by an SrnI process (see equation 57) When these chain mechanisms can occur, they allow reactions that were previously unknown Perfluoroalkylation, which used to be very rare, can now be accomplished by new methods (see for example equations 48-56, 65-70, 79, 107-108, 110, 113-135, 138-141, and 145-146)... 

One important experimental fact is that the rate of reaction of alcohols with hydrogen halides increases in the order methyl < primary < secondary < tertiary. This reactivity order parallels the caibocation stability order and is readily accommodated by the mechanism we have outlined. 

The lack of a uniform order of relative reactivity of the halogens in reactions of certain nucleophiles with nitro- and polynitro-phenyl halides led Parker and Read to propose a one-stage mechanism for some aromatic nucleophilic substitutions. An alternative explanation within the framework of the two-stage S Ar2 mechanism had been proposed earlier. A range of mechanisms has been considered in the past by Chapman, who properly points out that only in a limited number of examples is the evidence for the two-stage mechanism compelling even though the balance of evidence favors it. 

With highly reactive alkyl halides, like allylic, benzylic or phenacyl halides, the ZjA-alkylation can be a serious side-reaction. Because of a SNl-like mechanism in those cases, the effect of enolate concentration on the reaction rate is low, and the resulting monoalkylester 5 may be more acidic than the unsubstituted starting material ... 

Acid halides are among the most reactive of carboxylic acid derivatives and can be converted into many other kinds of compounds by nucleophilic acyl substitution mechanisms. The halogen can be replaced by -OH to yield an acid, by —OCOR to yield an anhydride, by -OR to yield an ester, or by -NH2 to yield an amide. In addition, the reduction of an acid halide yields a primary alcohol, and reaction with a Grignard reagent yields a tertiary alcohol. Although the reactions we ll be discussing in this section are illustrated only for acid chlorides, similar processes take place with other acid halides. 

Normally, reactive derivatives of sulfonic acids serve to transfer electrophilic sulfonyl groups259. The most frequently applied compounds of this type are sulfonyl halides, though they show an ambiguous reaction behavior (cf. Section III.B). This ambiguity is additionally enhanced by the structure of sulfonyl halides and by the reaction conditions in the course of electrophilic sulfonyl transfers. On the one hand, sulfonyl halides can displace halides by an addition-elimination mechanism on the other hand, as a consequence of the possibility of the formation of a carbanion a to the sulfonyl halide function, sulfenes can arise after halide elimination and show electrophilic as well as dipolarophilic properties. 

Redox catalysis appears also to be an elegant way to conduct alkylations. In this case the RX compound has to produce a free radical R which is sufficiently reactive toward the electron carrier A or its reduced form. Generally the mechanism, developed mainly for the case of alkyl halides, may be summarized as in reactions 25, 29-36. 

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