Nitration electrophile

The most widespread and convenient method for the preparation of nitrobenzazoles is the reaction of nitration. Electrophilic substitution of azoles is a complex reaction in which the experimental conditions can modify the product orientation. The ability of azoles to electrophilic substitution is determined by the activity of reagents, the basicity of substrates, and the acidity of medium. This caused some uncertainty in interpreting the results and complicated comparison of the reactivity of various azoles among them. The situation has changed after Katritzky and Johnson [7] had reported the criteria allowing, with a sufficient degree of reliance, the establishment in what form (base or conjugative acid) the compound reacts. The information on the mechanism of nitration of azoles is basically borrowed from the extensive literature on the nitration of aromatic and heteroaromatic compounds [8] therefore, it does not make sense to discuss this point in the review. 

Contrasted with electrophilic arcmatic nitration, electrophilic aliphatic nitrations are much affected by protolytic denitrations, which particularly with tertiary and secondary nitro compounds are of major in jortance. The fact that denitration affects electrophilic aliphatic nitration can be best demonstrated in the case of 2-nitro-2-methylpropane which was found to undergo protolytic cleavage in FS03H-SbF5, HF-SbF5, and also in HF-PF solution even at -80°. The protolytic cleavage reaction yields tert-butyl cation and nitrous acid (or subsequently, nitrosonium ion). No nitronium ion is formed, as indicated by absence of any... 

The nitration, sulphonation and Friedel-Crafts acylation of aromatic compounds (e.g. benzene) are typical examples of electrophilic aromatic substitution. 

The mechanism of aromatic aulphonation may be similar to that previously described for nitration and halogenation, involving attack of the electrophilic... 

This realization led me to study related possible intermolecular electrophilic reactions of saturated hydrocarbons, Not only protolytic reactions but also a broad scope of reactions with varied electrophiles (alkylation, formylation, nitration, halogenation, oxygenation, etc.) were found to be feasible when using snperacidic, low-nucleophilicity reaction conditions. 

Nitration is important for two reasons firstly, because it is the most general process for the preparation of aromatic nitro compounds secondly, because of the part which it has played in the development of theoretical organic chemistry. It is of interest because of its own characteristics as an electrophilic substitution. 

Nitration can be effected under a wide variety of conditions, as already indicated. The characteristics and kinetics exhibited by the reactions depend on the reagents used, but, as the mechanisms have been elucidated, the surprising fact has emerged that the nitronium ion is preeminently effective as the electrophilic species. The evidence for the operation of other electrophiles will be discussed, but it can be said that the supremacy of one electrophile is uncharacteristic of electrophilic substitutions, and bestows on nitration great utility as a model reaction. 

Concentrated solutions are here considered to be those containing > c. 89 % by weight of sulphuric acid. In these solutions nitric acid is completely ionised to the nitronium ion. This fact, and the notion that the nitronium ion is the most powerful electrophilic nitrating species, makes operation of this species in these media seem probable. Evidence on this point comes from the effect on the rate of added water ( 2.4.2)... 

For nitrations in sulphuric and perchloric acids an increase in the reactivity of the aromatic compound being nitrated beyond the level of about 38 times the reactivity of benzene cannot be detected. At this level, and with compounds which might be expected to surpass it, a roughly constant value of the second-order rate constant is found (table 2.6) because aromatic molecules and nitronium ions are reacting upon encounter. The encounter rate is measurable, and recognisable, because the concentration of the effective electrophile is so small. 

Kinetic studies of nitration using dilute solutions of dinitrogen pentoxide in organic solvents, chiefly carbon tetrachloride, have provided evidence for the operation, under certain circumstances of the molecular species as the electrophile. The reactions of benzene and toluene were inconveniently fast, and therefore a series of halogenobenzenes and aromatic esters was examined. 

In the uncatalysed reaction the fact that added nitrate strongly accelerates the rate to the same extent as other salts makes it improbable that the nitronium ion is the effective electrophile. The authors of the work conclude that covalent dinitrogen pentoxide is the electrophilic... 

Further evidence that the nitronium ion was not the electrophile in the uncatalysed reaction, and yet became effective in the catalysed reaction, came from differences in the orientation of substitution. The nitration of chlorobenzene in the uncatalysed reaction yielded only 43 % of the para compound, whereas, when the catalysed reaction was made important by adding some nitric acid, the ratio of substitution was that usually observed in nitration involving the nitronium ion ( 5.3.4). In the case of the uncatalysed reaction however, the reaction was complicated by the formation of nitrophenols. 

It has been necessary to comment upon these various studies because Olah and his co-workers have suggested that whilst nitrations, like those with nitronium salts, which give a relative rate of reaction of toluene with respect to benzene not much greater than unity involve the nitronium ion as the electrophile, this is not so in other cases. It is important to consider these opinions closely. In the earlier of the two relevant papers it is agreed that since nitrations of toluene with nitronium tetrafluoroborate in sulpholan show no abnormal o -ratio there... 

The nitronium ion is the electrophile in nitrations with nitronium salts in organic solvents. 

Another reason for discussing the mechanism of nitration in these media separately from that in inert organic solvents is that, as indicated above, the nature of the electrophile is not established, and has been the subject of controversy. The cases for the involvement of acetyl nitrate, protonated acetyl nitrate, dinitrogen pentoxide and the nitronium ion have been advocated. 

Despite the fact that solutions of acetyl nitrate prepared from purified nitric acid contained no detectable nitrous acid, the sensitivity of the rates of nitration of very reactive compounds to nitrous acid demonstrated in this work is so great that concentrations of nitrous acid below the detectable level could produce considerable catalytic effects. However, because the concentration of nitrous acid in these solutions is unknown the possibility cannot absolutely be excluded that the special mechanism is nitration by a relatively unreactive electrophile. Whatever the nature of the supervenient reaction, it is clear that there is at least a dichotomy in the mechanism of nitration for very reactive compounds, and that, unless the contributions of the separate mechanisms can be distinguished, quantitative comparisons of reactivity are meaningless. 

Again the uncertainty about the proportion of an observed result which is due to nitration and the proportion which is due to nitrosation exists. Thus, in expt. 11 phenol was being nitrated above the encounter rate and the observed isomer distribution could arise from a combination of nitration by whatever is the usual electrophile with nitration by a new, less reactive electrophile, or with nitrosation, or all three processes could be at work. 

The fact that nitration with acetyl nitrate is sometimes accompanied by acetoxylation has been mentioned ( 5.3.3). In proposing the ion pair ACONO2H+ NOg- as the nitrating agent, Fischer, Read and Vaughan also suggested that it was responsible for the acetoxylation, which was regarded as an electrophilic substitution. 

If acetoxylation were a conventional electrophilic substitution it is hard to understand why it is not more generally observed in nitration in acetic anhydride. The acetoxylating species is supposed to be very much more selective than the nitrating species, and therefore compared with the situation in (say) toluene in which the ratio of acetoxylation to nitration is small, the introduction of activating substituents into the aromatic nucleus should lead to an increase in the importance of acetoxylation relative to nitration. This is, in fact, observed in the limited range of the alkylbenzenes, although the apparently severe steric requirement of the acetoxylation species is a complicating feature. The failure to observe acetoxylation in the reactions of compounds more reactive than 2-xylene has been attributed to the incursion of another mechan-104... 

In earlier chapters we have been concerned with the identification of the effective electrophile in nitrations carried out under various conditions. We have seen that very commonly the nitronium ion is the electrophile, though dinitrogen pentoxide seems capable of assuming this role. We now consider how the electrophile, specifically the nitronium ion, reacts with the aromatic compound to cause nitration. 

For electrophilic substitutions in general, some form of the S 2 mechanism is now believed to operate. We can now review the evidence concerning the particular case of nitration. 

There is evidence for the existence of structures of this kind, and for their importance in electrophilic substitution in general, and in nitration in particular. Because of the way in which the electrophile is attached to the ring they are called cr-complexes. 

One mode of substitution occurring when the nitrating system consists of dinitrogen pentoxide in organic solvents involves molecular dinitrogen pentoxide as the effective electrophile ( 4.2.3). Evidence that the same electrophile operates when the nitrating system consists of a solution of benzoyl nitrate in carbon tetrachloride has also been given ( 5-2)-... 

If, on the other hand, the encounter pair were an oriented structure, positional selectivity could be retained for a different reason and in a different quantitative sense. Thus, a monosubstituted benzene derivative in which the substituent was sufficiently powerfully activating would react with the electrophile to give three different encounter pairs two of these would more readily proceed to the substitution products than to the starting materials, whilst the third might more readily break up than go to products. In the limit the first two would be giving substitution at the encounter rate and, in the absence of steric effects, products in the statistical ratio whilst the third would not. If we consider particular cases, there is nothing in the rather inadequate data available to discourage the view that, for example, in the cases of toluene or phenol, which in sulphuric acid are nitrated at or near the encounter rate, the... 

Relative electrophilic localization energies vs. logarithms of partial rate factors for nitration (a) Hiickel, (6) PPP with fixed /3. (From Dewar Thompson. ) (iv) Plot of log K vs. AB c. (From Dewar. )... 

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