Homolytic processes

The closely related N- arylazoaziridine system (278) decomposes in refluxing benzene to give aryl azides and alkenes, again stereospecifically (70T3245). However, biaryls, arenes and other products typical of homolytic processes are also formed in a competing reaction, although this pathway can be suppressed by the use of a polar solvent and electron withdrawing aryl substituents. 

A free-radical reaction is a chemical process which involves molecules having unpaired electrons. The radical species could be a starting compound or a product, but the most common cases are reactions that involve radicals as intermediates. Most of the reactions discussed to this point have been heterolytic processes involving polar intermediates and/or transition states in which all electrons remained paired throughout the course of the reaction. In radical reactions, homolytic bond cleavages occur. The generalized reactions shown below illustrate the formation of alkyl, vinyl, and aryl free radicals by hypothetical homolytic processes. 

Bromination of 10,10-dimethyl-2-aza-10-silanthrone (207) with NBS in acetic acid gave the 4-bromo derivative (30%), whereas in 80% sulfuric acid attack was in the 5- and 7-positions in the fused benzene ring (total yield 45%). Reduced yields in the presence of a radical initiator demonstrated that the reaction in acetic acid was not a homolytic process. The... 

Szele and Zollinger (1978 b) have found that homolytic dediazoniation is favored by an increase in the nucleophilicity of the solvent and by an increase in the elec-trophilicity of the P-nitrogen atom of the arenediazonium ion. In Table 8-2 are listed the products of dediazoniation in various solvents that have been investigated in detail. Products obtained from heterolytic and homolytic intermediates are denoted by C (cationic) and R (radical) respectively for three typical substituted benzenediazonium salts and the unsubstituted salt. A borderline case is dediazoniation in DMSO, where the 4-nitrobenzenediazonium ion follows a homolytic mechanism, but the benzenediazonium ion decomposes heterolytically, as shown by product analyses by Kuokkanen (1989) the homolytic process has an activation volume AF = + (6.4 0.4) xlO-3 m-1, whereas for the heterolytic reaction AF = +(10.4 0.4) x 10 3 m-1. Both values are similar to the corresponding activation volumes found earlier in methanol (Kuokkanen, 1984) and in water (Ishida et al., 1970). 

Heteroaromatic diazonium salts can also be used for Gomberg-Bachmann aryla-tions. Fukata et al. (1973) refluxed 3,5-dimethyl-4-diazopyrazole (10.27) in benzene and obtained 3,5-dimethyl-4-phenylpyrazole (10.28, 36%), biphenyl (10.29, 17%), 3,5-dimethylpyrazole (10.30, 12%), and pyrazolo[4,3-c]pyrazole (10.31, 15%). In nitrobenzene the three isomeric 3,5-dimethyl-4-(nitrophenyl)-pyrazoles were formed in the ratio o m p = 10 3 3. In the opinion of Fukata et al. this ratio and the course of the reaction indicate a homolytic process. The present author thinks that the data do not exclude a competitive heterolytic reaction with the pyrazolyl cation, because equal amounts of substitution of nitrobenzene in the 3- and 4-positions are not typical for a homolytic aromatic substitution. 

In triethylamine instead of benzene the reaction products are completely different, and are indicative of a homolytic process involving an initial electron transfer from triethylamine followed by a hydrogen atom transfer. Scheme 10-68 gives the major products, namely 1,3,5-tri-tert-butylbenzene (10.36, 20%), the oxime 10.39 (18%), formed from the nitroso compound 10.38, and the acetanilide 10.37 (40%). ESR and CIDNP data are consistent with Scheme 10-68. In their paper the authors discuss further products which were found in smaller yields. 

In addition, DMSO is able to induce a homolytic process with a diazonium ion (see Szele and Zollinger, 1978 b). This advantage of DMSO is emphasized by experiments of Meijs and Beckwith (1986) in acetone, which does not induce homolyses so easily. In acetone tar formation predominates. 

In Volume 13 reactions of aromatic compounds, excluding homolytic processes due to attack of atoms and radicals (treated in a later volume), are covered. The first chapter on electrophilic substitution (nitration, sulphonation, halogenation, hydrogen exchange, etc.) constitutes the bulk of the text, and in the other two chapters nucleophilic substitution and rearrangement reactions are considered. 

Heats of reaction and bond dissociation energies allow the estimation of the feasibility of homolytic processes, as these are largely — but not solely — governed by thermochemical effects. The quantitative treatment of heterolytic processes, however, presents a far more difficult problem. Basic electrostatic considerations indicate that the dissociation of a covalent bond into positive and negative ions is inherently a highly endothermic process. It will be facilitated by any mechanism that allows dissipation or stabilization of the incipient charges. Chemists have come to differentiate these... 

The cleavage of ion radicals may be a homolytic process rather than an... 

To study mechanisms C—E, it seems reasonable to employ both, electrochemical approaches and EPR-spectroscopy. It is important to be aware of the electrochemical properties of nitrones if used as spin traps for production of spin adducts (SA) is possible not only via homolytic process (C) but also via ionic processes shown in Scheme 2.77. In the case of (B), protonation can protect the... 

However, it is known, that in homolytical processes certaine influence on reaction rate has also so-called "cage effect", which is described by density of medium cohesion energy. That was confirmed by generalization of data concerning to influence of solvents upon decomposition rate of benzoyl peroxide [2] or oxidizing processes [3, 4], That is why the data analysis from work [1] is seemed as expedient by means of five parameter equation ... 

It is clear that these solvolytic reactions of ipso-adducts are markedly dependent on reaction conditions strongly acidic conditions and electron withdrawing substituents will favour a heterolytic process lower acidity, higher temperatures and electron releasing substituents probably favour homolytic processes. With so many factors involved, each substrate under each set of conditions gives rise to its own particular behaviour. 

It is clear from a study of thermal and radical-induced decompositions of N-alkoxycarbonyldihydropyridines that radical processes are of minor importance, and that pyridine formation is probably a consequence of 1,2-elimination of formate (Scheme 6). It has also been concluded that the rate of 1,4-elimination of formate from iV-alkoxycarbonyl-l,4-dihydropyridines at higher temperatures is too rapid to be explained by a homolytic process. 

Eisch [66AHC(7)1] considers that the relatively weak bonds in fluorine and iodine predispose these halogens to homolytic processes more than with chlorine and bromine. 

The thermal isomerization of a spirocyclic enol ether to the ketone [202] (Eq. 176) is probably a homolytic process. However, it is noted that part of the driving force for the reaction must be the bonding of the ethereal oxygen to a designated donor atom of the cross-conjugated cyclohexadienone moiety. 

The decay of LMOONO, generated either as in Eq. (36), or by substitution of peroxynitrite into a metal complex, is usually written as a homolytic process of Scheme 9. The LMO and N02 so generated can then either diffuse apart or recombine within the solvent cage to either regenerate the peroxynitrito complex or form the metal-nitrato intermediate, followed by release of free nitrate by hydrolysis. At the time we initiated the work described below, there were no clear examples of LMOONO species isomerizing to a metal nitrato complex, although such reactions have been considered as a possibility (180-182). 

The published research on the photochemical decomposition of di-azonium salts suggests that the two processes, a heterocyclic and a homolytic process, analogous to those of the thermal decomposition may occur. Various workers 36 187 have reported that phenols are formed when diazonium salts are photolyzed in water and aryl ethers result when an alcohol replaces water as the solvent. Homer and Stohr122 report that a process analogous to reductive deamination occurs in preference to ether formation results in alcohols. The importance of free radical intermediates in the photodecomposition, based on magnetic susceptibility measurements, has been stressed.25 Lee and his co-workers171 have recently suggested that in ethanol the photodecomposition of a diazonium salt occurs via a radical intermediate while in water an ionic process predominates. Thus, photodecomposition of a nitrobenzene diazonium chloride in water yielded both a nitrophenol and a chloronitrobenzene in ethanol, on the other hand, the major product of photolysis was the reduction product, nitrobenzene. 

The reactions of alkanes discussed in Chapter 4 are homolytic processes, which means that the bonds are made and broken through radical or atomic intermediates. In contrast, the SN and E reactions of alkyl halides, considered... 

The salient feature of the homolytic process is the presence of the free-radical intermediate. The- lack of charge of radicals and the high reactivity of nearly all of those that become involved in a typical organic reaction lead to important differences between homolytic and heterolytic processes. 

If a bond is particularly weak and/or nonpolar, bond cleavage can occur by a nonpolar or homolytic process. One elecd on of die shared pah goes widi each of the two bonded atoms. Bond breaking dien is die movement of single elecdons rather than elecdon pairs and is indicated in curved-arrow notation as halfheaded arrows. Homolytic cleavage of a bond does not result in the formation of charge but does result in the formation of unpaired electron intermediates called free radicals. Free radicals normally have seven electrons in the valence... 

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