Raney alkyne hydrogenation

Hydrogenation using Raney nickel is carried out under mild conditions and gives cis alkenes from internal alkynes in yields ranging from 50 to 100% [356, 357, 358, 359, 360]. Half hydrogenation of alkynes was also achieved over nickel prepared by reduction of nickel acetate with sodium borohydride (P-2 nickel, nickel boride) [349,361,362] or by reduction with sodium hydride [49], or by reduction of nickel bromide with potassium-graphite [363]. Other catalysts are palladium on charcoal [364], on barium sulfate [365, 366], on... 

Addition of hydrogen atoms in the presence of a metal catalyst to double or triple bonds is known as hydrogenation or catalytic hydrogenation. Alkenes and alkynes are reduced to alkanes by the treatment with H2 over a finely divided metal catalyst such as platinum (Pt—C), palladium (Pd—C) or Raney nickel (Ni). The platinum catalyst is also frequently used in the form of Pt02, which is known as Adams s catalyst. The catalytic hydrogenation reaction is a reduction reaction. 

The observation was a significant finding since at the time, when the only synthetic method to reduce alkynes selectively was their conversion by heterogeneous catalytic hydrogenation (Raney nickel) to cis alkenes. The dissolving-metal reduction provided easy access to high-purity trans alkenes since the latter do not readily react further under the conditions used. The efficient reduction of 1-alkynes in this system requires the presence of ammonium ion.196... 

Conversion of an alkene (or an alkyne) into an alkane is readily achieved by shaking it under hydrogen at room temperature and at atmospheric pressure in the presence of a platinium or palladium catalyst. With a Raney nickel catalyst somewhat higher temperatures and pressures are employed (see Section 2.17.1, P- 88). 

Alkynes are hydrogenated all the way to alkanes if the usual heterogeneous catalysts (Pd, Pt, Raney Ni) are used. If a suitable deactivated catalyst is used, however, it is possible to stop these reactions after monohydrogenation. The so-called Lindlar catalyst is a commonly used deactivated catalyst of this type (Figure 17.81). To prevent an overhydrogenation, it is still necessary to monitor the rate of hydrogen consumption and to interrupt the reaction after one equivalent of hydrogen gas has been absorbed even when the deactivated catalyst is used. The... 

Iron catalysts have found only limited use in usual hydrogenations, although they play industrially important roles in the ammonia synthesis and Fischer-Tropsch process. Iron catalysts have been reported to be selective for the hydrogenation of alkynes to alkenes at elevated temperatures and pressures. Examples of the use of Raney Fe, Fe from Fe(CO)5, and Urushibara Fe are seen in eqs. 4.27,4.28, and 4.29, respectively. 

Palladium in the form of Pd black or Pd/C is the most effective catalyst. Although Raney nickel has been used, there is doubt that it serves only as a hydrogen transfer catalyst because it contains a considerable amount of adsorbed hydrogen. Platinum and rhodium have been found to be ineffective. Both alkenes and alkynes have been hydrogenated and syn addition to 1,2-diphenylacetylene has been demonstrated. ... 

The reduction of a carbon-carbon multiple bond by the use of a dissolving metal was first accomplished by Campbell and Eby in 1941. The reduction of disubstituted alkynes to c/ s-alkenes by catalytic hydrogenation, for example by the use of Raney nickel, provided an excellent method for the preparation of isomerically pure c -alkenes. At the time, however, there were no practical synthetic methods for the preparation of pure trani-alkenes. All of the previously existing procedures for the formation of an alkene resulted in the formation of mixtures of the cis- and trans-alkenes, which were extremely difficult to separate with the techniques existing at that time (basically fractional distillation) into the pure components. Campbell and Eby discovered that dialkylacetylenes could be reduced to pure frani-alkenes with sodium in liquid ammonia in good yields and in remarkable states of isomeric purity. Since that time several metal/solvent systems have been found useful for the reduction of C=C and C C bonds in alkenes and alkynes, including lithium/alkylamine, ° calcium/alkylamine, so-dium/HMPA in the absence or presence of a proton donor,activated zinc in the presence of a proton donor (an alcohol), and ytterbium in liquid ammonia. Although most of these reductions involve the reduction of an alkyne to an alkene, several very synthetically useful reactions involve the reduction of a,3-unsaturated ketones to saturated ketones. ... 

Raney catalysts are used in a broad range of industrial hydrogenations. These include reductions of nitriles and dinitriles (e.g. for nylon intermediates), aldehydes (e.g. for sorbitol or alkane diols), olefins and alkynes (e.g. for monomer purification) and aromatic nitro compounds (e.g. for urethane intermediates). 

Raney ni[Pg.15]

Catalytic hydrogenation of alkynes takes place in a stepwise manner, and both the alkene and the alkane can he isolated. Complete reduction of alkynes to the saturated compound is easily accomplished over platinum, palladium or Raney nickel. A complication which sometimes arises, particularly with platinum catalysts, is the hydrogenolysis of hydroxyl groups a- to the alkyne (propargylic hydroxyl groups) (7.15). 

Catalytic hydrogenation (H2, Pd) of an alkene or alkyne affords an alkane product. Aldehyde and ketone carbonyls can be completely reduced to a methylene group (CH2) by a variety of methods, including the acidic Clem-menson reduction (Zn/Hg, HCl) and the basic Wolff-Kishner reduction (NH2NH2, KOH). An alternate strategy is to convert the carbonyl to a thioac-etal that can then be reduced to an alkane with Raney nickel (Ni-H2). 

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