Nucleophilic aromatic substitution reactions diazonium ions

Existing textbooks usually fail to show how common mechanistic steps link seemingly disparate reactions, or how seemingly similar transformations often have wildly disparate mechanisms. For example, substitutions at carbonyls and nucleophilic aromatic substitutions are usually dealt with in separate chapters in other textbooks, despite the fact that the mechanisms are essentially identical, and aromatic substitutions via diazonium ions are often dealt with in the same chapter as SrnI substitution reactions This textbook, by contrast, is organized according to mechanistic types, not according to overall transformations. This... 

The first widely used intermediates for nucleophilic aromatic substitution were the aryl diazonium salts. Aryl diazonium ions are usually prepared by reaction of an aniline with nitrous acid, which is generated in situ from a nitrite salt.81 Unlike aliphatic diazonium ions, which decompose very rapidly to molecular nitrogen and a carbocation (see Part A, Section 4.1.5), aryl diazonium ions are stable enough to exist in solution at room temperature and below. They can also be isolated as salts with nonnucleophilic anions, such as tetrafluoroborate or trifluoroacetate.82 Salts prepared with 0-benzenedisulfonimidate also appear to have potential for synthetic application.83... 

Chapter 11 focuses on aromatic substitution, including electrophilic aromatic substitution, reactions of diazonium ions, and palladium-catalyzed nucleophilic aromatic substitution. Chapter 12 discusses oxidation reactions and is organized on the basis of functional group transformations. Oxidants are subdivided as transition metals, oxygen and peroxides, and other oxidants. 

Although aromatic halides are inert to both SN1 and SN2 reactions (see Chapter 8), aromatic diazonium ions can act as the electrophilic partner in a nucleophilic substitution reaction. These ions are highly reactive because the leaving group, N2, is an extremely weak base ... 

The replacement of an electrofugic atom or group at a nucleophilic carbon atom by a diazonium ion is called an azo coupling reaction. By far the most important type of such reactions is that with aromatic coupling components, which was discovered by Griess in 1861 (see Sec. 1.1). It is a typical electrophilic aromatic substitution, called an arylazo-de-hydrogenation in the systematic IUPAC nomenclature (IUPAC 1989c, see Sec. 1.2). 

This chapter is concerned with reactions that introduce or replace substituent groups on aromatic rings. The most important group of reactions is electrophilic aromatic substitution. The mechanism of electrophile aromatic substitution has been studied in great detail, and much information is available about structure-reactivity relationships. There are also important reactions which occur by nucleophilic substitution, including reactions of diazonium ion intermediates and metal-catalyzed substitution. The mechanistic aspects of these reactions were discussed in Chapter 10 of Part A. In this chapter, the synthetic aspects of aromatic substitution will be emphasized. 

In this paper reactions of aromatic, heteroaromatic and related diazonium ions with nucleophiles are dia ussed. In such reactions substitution by the diazonium ion of an electrofugic atom or group bonded to carbon takes place. Occasionally reference is made to N- and P-coupling. In Section 4 the respective substitution at nitrogen (formation of diazoamino compounds) is included for comparative purposes. 

Diazonium salts react with various nucleophiles in water (Eq. 11.62).106 In acidic aqueous solution, p-pheny I e ncbis di azo ni um ion reacts with alcohols more rapidly than it does with water.107 In the presence of nucelophiles such as halides, the substitution products are obtained. Furthermore, diazonium salts of aromatic compounds are excellent substrates for palladium-catalyzed coupling reactions such as the Heck-type reactions in water. 

The most widely used approach to the preparation of PESs in both academic research and technical production is a polycondensation process involving a nucleophilic substitution of an aromatic chloro- or fluorosulfone by a phenoxide ion (Eq. (3)). Prior to the review of new PESs prepared by nucleophilic substitution publications should be mentioned which were concerned with the evaluation and comparison of the electrophilic reactivity of various mono- and difunctional fluoro-aromats [7-10]. The nucleophilic substitution of aromatic compounds may in general proceed via four different mechanism. Firstly, the Sni mechanism which is, for instance, characteristic for most diazonium salts. Secondly, the elimination-addition mechanism involving arines as intermediates which is typical for the treatment of haloaromats with strong bases at high temperature. Thirdly, the addition-elimination mechanism which is typical for fluorosulfones as illustrated in equations (3) and (4). Fourthly, the Snar mechanism which may occur when poorly electrophilic chloroaromats are used as reaction partners will be discussed below in connection with polycondensations of chlorobenzophenones. 

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