Selenium compounds trifluoromethyl

As mentioned in the introduction, partially fluorinated compounds are highly useful, however methods for their synthesis are strictly limited in many cases. For example, nucleophilic substitution occurs with difficulty at the position a to a trifluoromethyl group due to its strong electron-withdrawing effect, although sulfur and selenium nucleophiles undergo such a substitution rather efficiently (Scheme 6.1). 

In the reaction between trifluoromethyl iodide and selenium at 265—290° bistrifluoromethyl selenide, (CF3)2Se, and bistrifluoromethyl diselenide, (CF3)2Sea, are produced in yields of 40 and 20% respectively (Table 4). These two compounds show a number of interesting reactions. The compound (CF3)2Se is converted quantitatively to CF3CI and, SeCl4 when irradiated in a quartz vessel with ultraviolet light. If the irradiation is done in Pyrex, however, a new solid compound CFjSeClg is formed, which hydrolyses to the crystalline acid CF3SeO(OH) (m.p. 118°). The... 

Bis-3,4-(trifluoromethyl)-l,2-diselenete 651 is prepared by refluxing selenium with hexafluoro-2-butyne. It reacts with triphenylphosphine and triphenyl-arsine. Triphenylphosphine selenide was isolated, but no other compounds were identified.Ring-opened complexes with nickel, copper, vanadium, molybdenum (652), tungsten, iron, and cobalt are analogous to complexes of the 1,2-dithiete (527) (Section XXXV.2.C.). 

Aryl selenium compounds also form adducts with hydrogen peroxide, ArSe (O)OOH, that are able to carry out epoxidation [188,189], albeit at low rates [190,191]. Improvements can be made by substitution of the aromatic ring with electron-withdrawing trifluoromethyl groups [192], for example, to form the lizs-[3,5-Ws-(trifluoromethyl)phenyl]diselenide. 

Among a series of trifluoromethyl dibenzoheterocyclic onium salts derived from chalcogens, a small number of tellurium compounds have been prepared. As electrophilic trifluoromethylating agents, the tellurium compounds appeared as the least reactive. With a very reactive carbanion, the unsubstituted dibenzotellurophenium salt (81) gave only 9% of the trifluoromethylated product. With the p-diketone enolate, (81) did not react. However, the 3,7-dinitrotellurophenium salt (82) showed a relative activity similar to that of the unsubstituted selenium compound (47). 1... 

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