Organolithium compounds addition reactions

The thiophilic addition of aliphatic Grignard reagents to dithioesters deserves some comment. Although they are less reactive than organolithium compounds, their reactions are selective. With enethiolizable dithioesters, enethiolization cannot be avoided with the organolithium species, and at low temperatures this can become exclusive [332]. Enethiolization does not interfere in the case of the less... 

Organomagnesium compounds usually resemble organolithium compounds in their reactions with nitrogen heterocyclic aromatic compounds [E, G], but they generally give inferior results for preparative purposes. Thus, as in the case of organolithium compounds, addition normally occurs at the 2-position of pyridine, and subsequent elimination or oxidation gives the 2-substituted pyridine [1] ... 

Arylcopper intermediates can be generated from organolithium compounds, as in the preparation of cuprates.95 These compounds react with a second aryl halide to provide unsymmetrical biaryls in a reaction that is essentially a variant of the cuprate alkylation process discussed on p. 680. An alternative procedure involves generation of a mixed diarylcyanocuprate by sequential addition of two different aryllithium reagents to CuCN, which then undergo decomposition to biaryls on exposure to oxygen.96 The second addition must be carried out at very low temperature to prevent equilibration with the symmetrical diarylcyanocuprates. 

The organolithium compound which gives rise to the compound (11) can itself eliminate lithium fluoride, and mass spectrometric and other evidence has shown that this reaction is repeated until all the possible eliminations and subsequent additions have taken place 27h... 

One of the most interesting reactions of this type involves the intramolecular addition of the organolithium derivative to the aryne (13) which is derived from the dilithio-compound (12) 28>. This leads to the remarkably stable organolithium compound (14) which reacts with water to form the expected heptafluorobiphenylene, and with bromine to form 1-bromoheptafluorobiphenylene. 

One of the important new directions in the study of addition reactions of organozinc compounds to aldehydes is the use of ionic liquids. Usually, application of these compounds in reactions with common organometallic reagents has a serious problem ionic solvents are usually reactive toward them, particularly Grignard and organolithium derivatives. It has been recently reported that carbonyl compounds react with allylzinc bromide formed in situ from allyl bromide and zinc in the ionic liquid 3-butyl-l-methylimidazolium tetrafluoroborate, [bmim][BF4].285 Another important finding is that the more reactive ZnEt2 alkylates aldehydes in a number of ionic liquids at room temperature.286 The best yields (up to 96%) were obtained in A-butylpyridinium tetrafluoroborate, [bpy][BF4] (Scheme 107). 

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