Stabilizing effects, carbene

Wanzlick showed that the stability of carbenes is increased by a special substitution pattern of the disubstituted carbon atom [12-16]. Substituents in the vicinal position, which provide n-donor/a-acceptor character (Scheme 2, X), stabilize the lone pair by filling the p-orbital of the carbene carbon. The negative inductive effect reduces the electrophilicity and therefore also the reactivity of the singlet carbene. 

As heavier analogs of carbenes141) stannylenes can be used as ligands in transition-metal chemistry. The stability of carbene complexes is often explained by a synergetic c,7t-effect cr-donation from the lone electron pair of the carbon atom to the metal is compensated by a a-backdonation from filled orbitals of the metal to the empty p-orbital of the carbon atom. This concept cannot be transferred to stannylene complexes. Stannylenes are poor p-a-acceptors no base-stabilized stannylene (SnX2 B, B = electron donor) has ever been found to lose its base when coordinated with a transition metal (M - SnXj B). Up to now, stannylene complexes of transition metals were only synthesized starting from stable monomoleeular stannylenes. Divalent tin compounds are nevertheless efficient cr-donors as may be deduced from the displacement reactions (17)-(20) which open convenient routes to stannylene complexes. 

In contrast to methylene, carbenes which contain an oxygen atom bonded to the carbenic center are known to exist as singlet ground states. The rational for this is that the lone pair electrons on the adjacent oxygen atom have a resonance stabilizing effect on the electron deficient carbenic center ... 

Such solvent stabilization effects on the reactivity of singlet carbenes in equilibrium with their triplet ground states have also been observed experimentally in other arylcarbene derivatives. ... 

A laser flash photolysis study of phenylacyloxycarbene (75) allowed the measurement of the rate of 1,2-acyl shift of between 105 and 106 s 1 in pentane at room temperature.82 The activation parameters were in good agreement with calculations. High-level calculations supported a carbanion-like attack by the carbene lone pah on the carbonyl (76) whereas the effects of substituents on the rate suggested an acyl anion-like transition state (77). The electron-donating, stabilizing effect of OAc slows the 1,2-C and 1,2-H shifts in alkylacetoxycarbenes (78),83 allowing 1,2-acetyl shifts to compete. 

Further stabilization of 1,3,2-diazaphospholane cations can be achieved by incorporating the N-P(+)-N unit in a 6n system, resulting in an electronic structure analogous to the Arduengo carbene [30, 237-243], It has been shown that while the most important stabilizing effect is exerted by the amino groups on the phosphenium center, the 6it-delocalization indeed has a contribution [30] to the stability of these systems. It is of further interest that the diazaphospholes derived from the... 

In spite of the successful use of NHCs in a number of palladium-catalyzed reactions, no system for hydrogenation was reported until 2005. This can be easily explained as it had been observed that hydridopalladium-carbene species decompose due to attack of the hydride on the carbene, which results in its reductive elimination to yield the corresponding imidazolium salt [ 190]. However, Cavell and co-workers recently showed that the oxidative addition of imidazolium salts to bis-carbenic palladium complexes leads to isolable NHC-hydridopalladium complexes [191]. This elegant work evidenced the remarkable stabilizing effect of NHC ligands in otherwise reactive species and led to the development of the first NHC-palladium catalyst for hydrogenation. 

Fischer recognized the first carbene complexes in 1964. They were formed by the attack of an alkyllithium on a metal carbonyl followed by methylation (equations 1 and 2). Resonance form (2), considered as the dominant one in the heteroatom stabilized Fischer carbenes, shows the multiple character of this carbon-heteroatom bond. This effect is responsible for the restricted rotation often observed for this bond in nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) studies. For example cis and trans isomers (6) and (7) of methoxymethyl carbenes rapidly interconvert at room temperature, but can be frozen out in the proton NMR at -40 °C. By contrast, the M-C bond is close to single and often rotates freely. 

The deprotonation step was deduced from H/D exchange studies and the second stage from a steady-state treatment of the overall rates of hydrolysis. Stabilisation of the intermediate carbanions by halogen follows the order I > Br > Cl > F (Chapter 4, Section VII) and loss of halide ion in stage 2 is in the order of leaving group ability, I > Br > Cl > F. Therefore, it was possible to conclude that the effect of fluorine on the stability of carbenes is in the order F > Cl > Br > 1 [42]. 

Very few pericyclic reactions of carbene complexes have been studied that are not in the cycloaddition class. The two examples that are known involve ene reactions and Claisen rearrangements. Both of these reactions have been recently studied and thus future developments in this area are anticipated. Ene reactions have been observed in the the reactions of alkynyl carbene complexes and enol ethers, where a competition can exist with [2 + 2] cycloadditions. Ene products are the major components firom the reaction of silyl enol ethers and [2 + 2] cycloadducts are normally the exclusive products with alkyl enol ethers (Section 9.2.2.1). As indicated in equation (7), methyl cyclohexenyl ether gives the [2 -t- 2] adduct (84a) as the major product along with a minor amount of the ene product (83a). The t-butyldimethylsilyl enol ether of cyclohexanone gives the ene product 9 1 over the [2 + 2] cycloadduct. The reason for this effect of silicon is not known at this time but if the reaction is stepwise, this result is one that would be expected on the basis of the silicon-stabilizing effect on the P-oxonium ion. 

Despite the negative inductive effect of fluorine, because of its electronegativity, a-fluorinated carbenes are stabilized in their singlet state by -donation from the fluorine to the carbon. This combination of destabilizing and stabilizing effects renders difluorocarbene a moderately electrophilic species [35]. 

It is easy to see how difficult it is to stabilize triplet carbene. It is not stabilized by a polar effect, either internally or externally, since it is electronically neutral... 

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