Unreactive alkyl halides

This extraction is intended to remove traces of unreacted alkyl halide that might compete for the thiolate in the nucleophilic substitution (Step B). 

To avoid the formation of ketenes by alkoxide elimination, ester enolates are often prepared at low temperatures. If unreactive alkyl halides are used, the addition of BU4NI to the reaction mixture can be beneficial [134]. Examples of the radical-mediated a-alkylation of support-bound a-haloesters are given in Table 5.4. Further methods for C-alkylating esters on insoluble supports include the Ireland-Claisen rearrangement of O-allyl ketene acetals (Entry 6, Table 13.16). Malonic esters and similar strongly C,H-acidic compounds have been C-alkylated with Merrifield resin [237,238]. 

Leave the flask with the oily residue under high vacuum (<0.1 mmHg, 3 h) in order to remove most of the unreacted alkyl halide. 

It is useful to re-examine Chapter 3, Section VI describing conventional carbocationic polymerizations. Termination reactions are not very common and involve either the formation of too stable carbocations, unreactive alkyl halides, usually alkyl fluorides, or unreactive onium ions via reaction with very strong nucleophiles (impurities or intentionally added compounds) ... 

Direct reactions of tin metal with relatively reactive alkyl halides are widely used methods for the preparation of dialkyldihaiostannanes (eq (125)) [120], Using catalysts such as other metals, metal halides, or Lewis bases, this method can be also applied to unreactive alkyl halides (eq (126)) [121],... 

Conventional base-catalyzed alkylation of thioindoxyl 1,1-dioxide with unreactive alkyl halides does not proceed cleanly the products 66 (X = H, Y = alkyl) are better obtained by alkylation in the presence of the sterically hindered base, diisopropylethylamine, in propan-2-ol.287 Thioindoxyl 1,1-dioxide reacts as expected in the Michael reaction e.g., with acrylonitrile, 66 (X = H, Y = CH2CH2CN) is obtained. Treatment of thioindoxyl 1,1-dioxide with p-toluenesulfonyl azide288 or 2-azido-3-ethylbenzothiazolium tetrafluoroborate289 affords the diazo compound 66 (XY = N2), which gives the 2-methoxy compound 66 (X = H, Y = OMe) when treated with MeOH-Cu-HC104.288... 

In view of the general hazards of handling azides, the scale of reaction should probably be reduced considerably. The removal of unreacted alkyl halide with silver nitrate may lead to silver azide formation and should, therefore, be replaced by another procedure. 

Notice that all the examples m Table 8 1 involve alkyl halides, that is compounds m which the halogen is attached to an sp hybridized carbon Alkenyl halides and aryl halides, compounds m which the halogen is attached to sp hybridized carbons are essentially unreactive under these conditions and the principles to be developed m this chapter do not apply to them... 

The alkyl halide can be primary secondary or tertiary Alkyl iodides are the most reac tive followed by bromides then chlorides Fluorides are relatively unreactive... 

A key step in the reaction mechanism appears to be nucleophilic attack on the alkyl halide by the negatively charged copper atom but the details of the mechanism are not well understood Indeed there is probably more than one mechanism by which cuprates react with organic halogen compounds Vinyl halides and aryl halides are known to be very unreactive toward nucleophilic attack yet react with lithium dialkylcuprates... 

In contrast to nucleophilic substitution m alkyl halides where alkyl fluorides are exceedingly unreactive aryl fluorides undergo nucleophilic substitution readily when the ring bears an o or a p nitro group... 

In the absence of die polyether, potassium fluoride is insoluble in benzene and unreactive toward alkyl halides. Similar enhancement of solubility and reactivity of other salts is observed in the presence of crown ethers The solubility and reactivity enhancement result because the ionic compound is dissociated to a tightly complexed cation and a naked anion. Figure 4.13 shows the tight coordination that can be achieved with a typical crown ether. The complexed cation, because it is surrounded by the nonpolar crown ether, has high solubility in the nonpolar media. To maintain electroneutrality, the anion is also transported into the solvent. The cation is shielded from interaction with the anion as a... 

It is a reaction of wide scope both the phosphite 1 and the alkyl halide 2 can be varied. Most often used are primary alkyl halides iodides react better than chlorides or bromides. With secondary alkyl halides side reactions such as elimination of HX can be observed. Aryl halides are unreactive. 

A tertiary homopropargylic alcohol could also be prepared by treatment of ethyl acetate with two equivalents of B-allenyl-9-BBN. However, the reaction proceeded slowly and was not general for other esters, which proved to be unreactive, as were tertiary amides and alkyl halides. However, homopropargylic amines could be prepared in high yield and with minimal allenic byproduct through allenylboration of imines with B-allenyl-9-BBN (Eq. 9.24). 

If the potential leaving group is attached to unsaturated carbon, as in vinyl chloride or phenyl chloride, attack by nucleophiles is also extremely difficult, and these compounds are very unreactive in Sn2 reactions compared with simple alkyl halides. In these cases, the reason is not so much steric but electrostatic, in that the nucleophile is repelled by the electrons of the unsaturated system. In addition, since the halide is attached to carbon through an 5p -hybridized bond, the electrons in the bond are considerably closer to carbon than in an 5/ -hybridized bond of an alkyl halide (see Section 2.6.2). Lastly, resonance stabilization in the halide gives some double bond character to the C-Hal bond. This effectively strengthens the bond and makes it harder to break. This lack of reactivity is also tme for SnI reactions (see Section 6.2). 

Mg+" reacts with alkyl halides in the gas phase via a range of substrate-dependent pathways Not all halides are reactive—examples of unreactive substrates include methyl chloride, vinyl chloride, trichloro and tetrachloro ethylene. Reaction with ethyl chloride proceeds via an elimination reaction (equation 18) followed by a displacement reaction (equation 19). For larger alkyl halides, such as isopropyl chloride, chloride abstraction also occurs (equation 20). For multiply halogenated substrates such as carbon tetrachloride, oxidative reactions occur (equations 21 and 22), although organometallic... 

Arylzinc species prepared via the sacrificial anode process and from aryl halides in the presence of a nickel 2,2 -bipyridine, as already reported in Section . .1, were found totally unreactive towards common electrophiles such as aldehydes, carboxylic anhydrides or activated alkyl halides. However, they react with some electrophiles when they are activated by the presence of a catalytic amount of copper salts (10 mol% Cul) together with tetramethylethylene diamine (1MEDA) as described by Knochel and Singer on the ArZnX—CuCN metal exchange47 or when the reaction is catalyzed by palladium complex. 

The normal-propylamine NPT has been made by the oxalylamide route, with the amide with a mp 179-181 °C (75%) from benzene and NPT hydrochloride mp 186-187 °C (33%) from MeOH/benzene. An attempt to make NPT by the alkyl halide procedure failed. Using these same ratios of reactants, there was the formation of a sizable quantity of DPT with appreciable unreacted tryptamine presence (T NPT DPT/1 5 4). A recycling under the same conditions gave T NPT DPT/0 3 7) and a third cycle gave only DPT, but with a loss of almost 90% of the material presumably to quaternary salt formation. Interestingly NPT is less toxic than DPT in experimental mice, but has not been assayed yet in man. 

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