Ionization solvent effects

Aromatic steroids are virtually insoluble in liquid ammonia and a cosolvent must be added to solubilize them or reduction will not occur. Ether, ethylene glycol dimethyl ether, dioxane and tetrahydrofuran have been used and, of these, tetrahydrofuran is the preferred solvent. Although dioxane is often a better solvent for steroids at room temperature, it freezes at 12° and its solvent effectiveness in ammonia is diminished. Tetrahydrofuran is infinitely miscible with liquid ammonia, but the addition of lithium to a 1 1 mixture causes the separation of two liquid phases, one blue and one colorless, together with the separation of a lithium-ammonia bronze phase. Thus tetrahydrofuran and lithium depress the solubilities of each other in ammonia. A tetrahydrofuran-ammonia mixture containing much over 50 % of tetrahydrofuran does not become blue when lithium is added. In general, a 1 1 ratio of ammonia to organic solvents represents a reasonable compromise between maximum solubility of steroid and dissolution of the metal with ionization. 

Ejfect ofSolvent. In addition to the solvent effects on certain SeI reactions, mentioned earlier (p. 764), solvents can influence the mechanism that is preferred. As with nucleophilic substitution (p. 448), an increase in solvent polarity increases the possibility of an ionizing mechanism, in this case SeI, in comparison with the second-order mechanisms, which do not involve ions. As previously mentioned (p. 763), the solvent can also exert an influence between the Se2 (front or back) and SeI mechanisms in that the rates of Se2 mechanisms should be increased by an increase in solvent polarity, while Sni mechanisms are much less affected. 

A unimolecular ionization was shown to be the mechanism of solvolysis by means of rate studies, solvent effects, salt effects, and structural effects (179,180). The products of reaction consist of benzo [bjthiophen derivatives 209 or nucleophilic substitution products 210, depending upon the solvent system employed. By means of a series of elegant studies, Modena and co-workers have shown that the intermediate ion 208 can have either the open vinyl cation structure 208a or the cyclic thiirenium ion 208b, depending... 

Kinetic data can be discussed in terms of bromine bridging in ionic intermediates if the transition states of the ionization step are late. It appears that this is the case in the bromination of a wide variety of olefins, and in particular of alkenes, stilbenes and styrenes. Large p- and m-values for kinetic substituent and solvent effects (p. 253) consistent with high degrees of charge development at the transition states, are found for the reaction of these compounds. It can therefore be concluded that their transition states closely resemble the ionic intermediates. 

The second series of data on protic solvent effects in bromination that are related to transition states comprises the m-values of solvent-reactivity correlations. First, it is important to underline that 7-parameters, the solvent ionizing powers, established from solvolytic displacements, work fairly well in this electrophilic addition. This is expected since bromination, like SN1 reactions, leads to a cation-anion pair by heterolytic dissociation of the bromine-olefin CTC, a process similar to the ionization of halogenated or ether derivatives (Scheme 14). 

As a result of the inductive and hyperconjugative effects it is to be expected that tertiary carbonium ions will be more stable than secondary carbonium ions, which in turn will be more stable than primary ions. The stabilization of the corresponding transition states for ionization should be in the same order, since the transition state will somewhat resemble the ion. Thus the first order rate constant for the solvolysis of tert-buty bromide in alkaline 80% aqueous ethanol at 55° is about 4000 times that of isopropyl bromide, while for ethyl and methyl bromides the first order contribution to the hydrolysis rate is imperceptible against the contribution from the bimolecular hydrolysis.217 Formic acid is such a good ionizing solvent that even primary alkyl bromides hydrolyze at a rate nearly independent of water concentration. The relative rates at 100° are tertiary butyl, 108 isopropyl, 44.7 ethyl, 1.71 and methyl, 1.00.218>212 One a-phenyl substituent is about as effective in accelerating the ionization as two a-alkyl groups.212 Thus the reactions of benzyl compounds, like those of secondary alkyl compounds, are of borderline mechanism, while benzhydryl compounds react by the unimolecular ionization mechanism. 

The major uses of non-ionizing solvents in chemical analysis are twofold. They may be used simply to provide media for the dissolution and reaction of covalent materials, or they may play a more active part in a chemical process. For example, oxygen-containing organic solvents can be used to effect the solvent extraction of metal ions from acid aqueous solutions the lone pair of electrons possessed by the oxygen atom forming a dative bond with the proton followed by the extraction of the metal ion as an association complex. 

These data were measured at about 1 wt % NH in the liquid phase instead of 0.1 wt % NH, used for the NaOH measurements. For this reason they do not extrapolate to the same volatility ratio at zero concentration of electrolyte. When correction is made for ionization and solvent effects of ammonia, then the two intercepts agree. 

A calculated transition energy used to assess the polarity of a solvent. The solvent ionizing capability directly affects the position of a peak, easily measured, in the ultraviolet region of the spectrum of the complex of an iodide ion with 2-methyl- or l-ethyl-4-carbomethoxypyridinium ion. Water has a Z value of 94.6, ethanol has a value of 79.6, dimethyl sulfoxide s value is 71.1, and benzene has a value of 54. A similar polarity scale, known as x(30) values, is related to the Z value scale Z = 1.41 t(30) -E 6.92. See Solvent Effects... 

There is an ongoing controversy about whether there is any stabilization of the transition state for nucleophilic substitution at tertiary aliphatic carbon from interaction with nucleophilic solvent." ° This controversy has developed with the increasing sophistication of experiments to characterize solvent effects on the rate constants for solvolysis reactions. Grunwald and Winstein determined rate constants for solvolysis of tert-butyl chloride in a wide variety of solvents and used these data to define the solvent ionizing parameter T (Eq. 3). They next found that rate constants for solvolysis of primary and secondary aliphatic carbon show a smaller sensitivity (m) to changes in Y than those for the parent solvolysis reaction of tert-butyl chloride (for which m = 1 by definition). A second term was added ( N) to account for the effect of changes in solvent nucleophilicity on obsd that result from transition state stabilization by a nucleophilic interaction between solvent and substrate. It was first assumed that there is no significant stabilization of the transition state for solvolysis of tert-butyl chloride from such a nucleophilic interaction. However, a close examination of extensive rate data revealed, in some cases, a correlation between rate constants for solvolysis of fert-butyl derivatives and solvent nucleophicity. " ... 

Many other solvent parameters have been defined in an attempt to model as thoroughly as possible solvent effects on the rate constants for solvolysis. These include (a) Several scales of solvent ionizing power Tx developed for different substrates R—X that are thought to undergo limiting stepwise solvolysis. (b) Several different scales of solvent nucleophilicity developed for substrates of different charge type that undergo concerted bimolecular substitution by solvent. (c) An... 

Solvent effects Protic solvents are especially useful since the hydrogen bonding stabilizes the anionic leaving group after ionization. Ionization requires the stabilization of both positive and negative charges. Solvents with higher dielectric constant (e), which is a measure of a solvent s polarity, have faster rates for SnI reactions. 

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