Isotopes esterification

These results do not prove that the ester is an essential intermediate in aqueous solution even though it is present, but the result with the hindred triterpene is convincing In this case the esterification step, which is normally fast, has become rate-determining and the disappearance of the isotope effect must mean that C-H cleavage occurs after the formation of the ester and not independently of it. The generality of this result is apparent from the stopped-flow investigation of isopropanol oxidation ... 

Since the imidazolide method proceeds almost quantitatively, it has been used for the synthesis of isotopically labeled esters (see also Section 3.2), and it is always useful for the esterification of sensitive carboxylic acids, alcohols, and phenols under mild conditions. This advantage has been utilized in biochemistry for the study of transacylating enzymes. A number of enzymatic transacylations (e.g., those catalyzed by oc-chymo-trypsin) have been shown to proceed in two steps an acyl group is first transferred from the substrate to the enzyme to form an acyl enzyme, which is then deacylated in a second step. In this context it has been shown[21] that oc-chymotrypsin is rapidly and quantitatively acylated by Af-fraw.s-cinnamoylimidazole to give /ra/w-cinnamoyl-a-chymotrypsin, which can be isolated in preparative quantities and retains its enzymatic activity (see also Chapter 6). 

Carboxylic Esters and of Esterification of Carboxylic Acids. Acid Hydrolysis of an Ester with Heavy Oxygen as Isotopic Indicator. J. chem. Soc. [London] 1939, 838. 

The mechanism of the Fischer esterification was controversial until 1938, when Irving Roberts and Harold Urey of Columbia University used isotopic labeling to follow the alcohol oxygen atom through the reaction. A catalytic amount of sulfuric acid was added to a mixture of 1 mole of acetic acid and 1 mole of special methanol containing the heavy lsO isotope of oxygen. After a short period, the acid was neutralized to stop the reaction, and the components of the mixture were separated. 

This is the general mechanism for acid catalyzed oxygen isotope exchange of carboxylic acids and esters, esterification, ester hydrolysis, and amide hydrolysis (see Vol. 10). 

As already indicated, a special problem with esters is their preparation from two natural precursor molecules by a chemical ester synthesis. Such products have to be labelled nature-identical. For an interesting positional H-NMR study on ethyl butyrate from enzymatic esterification of beet ethanol with butyric acid from milk see [317]. Another chance to detect a corresponding adulteration would be a positional carbon and oxygen isotope analysis of the ester components. Isotope effects on the esterification reaction in question seem to influence characteristically the 8-values of the atoms involved, and hence form a basis for the origin assignment of these compounds (for further details see 6.2.2.4.4). 

To identify the bond breakages in esterification, an alcohol containing the 180 isotope is used. After esterification it is seen that the 180 isotope appears in the ester. This result reveals that the water is formed from the hydroxyl group of the acid and the hydrogen of the alcohol. In other words the — OR group from the alcohol molecule replaces the —OH group of the acid molecule. 

In some doublet reactions the same products may be obtained from the same reactants but in different ways. Such reactions were referred to as olistomeric and the structural conditions of their appearance were determined on the basis of the multiplet theory (348). Thus, theoretically two cases of bond fission can take place in esterification, HO—COR + H—OR and H—OCOR HO—R. The tracer method shows that the first case is realized as a rule. The half-doublet scheme expresses such experiments. The doublet indexes for the reactions in solutions disintegrate into such schemes see Balandin (37). A complete system of doublet reactions for C, H, N, 0, S, and Cl (without their isotopes) has been obtained by the author (345). It is much more detailed than Table VII and amounts to 1500 types. It was obtained by exhaustive variation of atoms and bonds in the index by means of a specially developed method based on matrix algebra and combinatorial analysis. The significance of the obtained classification for organic catalysis is similar to that of the complete system of forms in crystallography, which was derived from the groups of symmetry by Fedorov and covers all possible forms (349). 

Isotopes of elements are useful in chemistry for studies of the mechanisms of chemical reactions. A standard technique is to label one of the atoms in a molecule by using an isotope of the element. It is then possible to trace the way in which this atom behaves throughout the course of the reaction. For example, in the esterification reaction ... 

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