Nucleophiles unreactive, activation

Lithium isopropane nitronate Reactive nucleophiles as activators of unreactive nucleophiles Preferential replacement of nitro groups... 

In the strongly basic medium, the reactant is the phenoxide ion high nucleophilic activity at the ortho and para positions is provided through the electromeric shifts indicated. The above scheme indicates theorpara substitution is similar. The intermediate o-hydroxybenzal chloride anion (I) may react either with a hydroxide ion or with water to give the anion of salicyl-aldehyde (II), or with phenoxide ion or with phenol to give the anion of the diphenylacetal of salicylaldehyde (III). Both these anions are stable in basic solution. Upon acidification (III) is hydrolysed to salicylaldehyde and phenol this probably accounts for the recovery of much unreacted phenol from the reaction. 

The kinetics of formation of phosphonates by reaction of o-dinitrobenzene with phosphites have been examined. The energy of activation for the reaction increases as the nucleophilicity of the phosphite decreases, e.g. ethyl diphenylphosphinite 14kcalmol"S diethyl phenylphosphonite 16 kcalmol S and triethyl phosphite 21kcalmol . An intermediate of the type (61), formed by nucleophilic attack of the phosphite, was proposed. In (61) there is a particularly favourable electrostatic interaction. That p-dinitrobenzene is unreactive, is thought to stem from the fact that this compound cannot form an intermediate with such a stabilizing factor. 

LLB, a so-called heterobimetallic catalyst, is believed to activate both nucleophiles and electrophiles.162 For the hydrophosphonylation of comparatively unreactive aldehydes, the activated phosphite can react with only the molecules precoordinated to lanthanum (route A). The less favored route (B) is a competing reaction between Li-activated phosphite and unactivated aldehyde, and this unfavored reaction can be minimized if aldehydes are introduced slowly to the reaction mixture, thus maximizing the ratio of activated to inactivated aldehyde present in solution. Route A regenerates the catalyst and completes the catalysis cycle (Fig. 2-9). 

Suicide substrates and quiescent affinity labels, unlike the other types of inhibitors discussed in this chapter, form covalent bonds with active site nucleophiles and thereby irreversibly inactivate their target enzymes. A suicide substrate,191 also described by Silverman in a comprehensive review1101 as a mechanism-based inactivator, is a molecule that resembles its target enzyme s true substrate but contains a latent (relatively unreactive) electrophile. When the target enzyme attempts to turn over the... 

The sulfoxide method was introduced by Kahne and coworkers,1 and was heralded as a new method for rapid glycosylation of unreactive substrates in high yield under mild conditions. The reaction involves the sulfoxide donor [sulfoxide (I)], an activating agent (usually triflic anhydride), a hindered, nonnucleophilic base (2,6-di-tert-butyl-4-mcthylpyridine, DTBMP) and a nucleophilic acceptor (most often an alcohol) (Scheme 3.1). The glycosylation of sterically hindered steroidal alcohols, phenols and the /V-glycosylation of an acetamide was reported (Table 3.1). 

Ethylene is the template for olefin reactions, but ethylene itself is rather unreactive, undergoing electrophilic attack by moderately strong Lewis acids. Nucleophilic attack on the bond even by the strongest Lewis bases has not been reported. The following sequence involves intramolecular addition of a carbanion to an unactivated olefin [111, 112]. The reaction is undoubtedly facilitated by active participation of the lithium cation as a Lewis acid [113]. 

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