Weak Bases, Catalysis

An alternative analysis (74b) removes malonic acid from phenol—the logic being that ester formation will make the Friedel-Crafts part of the reaction intramolecular. In the event, this is a one step procedure with acid catalysis. The Warfarin synthesis uses weak base catalysis. ... 

In Chapter 10 we used pyridine as a catalyst in carbonyl substitution reactions, even though it is only a weak base. Catalysis by pyridine involves two mechanisms, and is discussed on p. 200.Acetate ion is another weak base which can catalyse the formation of esters from anhydrides ... 

This type of ring interconversion is represented by the general expression shown in Scheme 15. Analogous rearrangements occur in benzo-fused systems. The known conversions are limited to D = O in the azole system, i.e. cleavage of the weak N—O bond occurs readily. Under the reaction conditions, Z needs to be a good nucleophile in its own right or by experimental enhancement (base catalysis, solvent, etc.) and Z is usually O, S, N or C. 

The most intensively studied oxidizing system is that developed by Pfitzner and Moflatt in which the oxidation is carried out at room temperature in the presence of dicyclohexylcarbodiimide (DCC) and a weak acid such as pyridinium trifluoroacetate or phosphoric acid. The DCC activates the DMSO which in turn reacts with the carbinol to give an oxysulfonium intermediate. This breaks down under mild base catalysis to give the desired ketone and dimethyl sulfide. 

Goi. As noted previously, an a-chlorine atom renders a ring-nitrogen atom very weakly basic. Cyanuric chloride (5) is a very weak base both because s-triazines are of low basicity and because each of the ring-nitrogen atoms is alpha to two chlorine atoms. Hence, this compound should be insensitive to acid catalysis or acid autocatalysis and this has been observed for the displacement of the first chlorine atom with alcohols in alcohol-acetone solution and with water (see, however. Section II,D,2,6). 

A reaction with a rate constant that conforms to Eq. (10-21)—particularly to the feature that the catalysts are H+ and OH-, and not weak acids and bases—is said to show specific acid-base catalysis. This phenomenon is illustrated by the kinetic data for the hydrolysis of methyl o-carboxyphenyl acetate16 (the methyl ester of aspirin— compare with Section 6.6) ... 

Weak acids and bases are, generally speaking, less effective catalysts than H+ and OH at the same concentrations. Proton transfer occurs in all acid-base catalysis, regardless of the detailed mechanism (this aspect is considered in the next section). It is only... 

Solvolyses of the A(A -diphenylcarbamoylpyridinium ion (126) were found to be subject to specific and/or general base catalysis, which could be eliminated by addition of perchloric acid or increased, especially in fluoroalcohol-containing solvents, by addition of pyridine. The uncatalysed solvolyses in aqueous methanol and aqueous ethanol involve a weakly nucleophilically assisted (/ = 0.22) heterolysis and the solvolyses in the pure alcohols are anomalously slow. ... 

Shackelford and co-workers studied the 1,2-addition of 2,2-dinitropropanol, 2,2,2-trinitroethanol, and 2-fluoro-2,2-dinitroethanol across the double bonds of vinyl ethers. These reactions are Lewis acid catalyzed because of the weak nucleophilic character of alcohols which contain two or three electron-withdrawing groups on the carbon p to the hydroxy functionality. Base catalysis is precluded since alkaline conditions lead to deformylation with the formation of formaldehyde and the nitronate salt. 

An excellent demonstration of the tunability of ionic liquids for catalysis is provided by an investigation of the dimerization of 1-butene (235). A Ni(cod)(hfacac) catalyst (Scheme 23) was evaluated for the selective dimerization of 1-butene after it was dissolved in various chloroaluminate ionic liquids. Earlier work on this reaction with the same catalyst in toluene led to the observations of low activity and difficult catalyst separation. In ionic liquids of varying acidity, little catalytic activity was found. However, a remarkable activity was achieved by adding a weak buffer base to an acidic ionic liquid. The reaction took place in a biphasic reaction mode with facile catalyst separation and catalyst recycling. A high selectivity to the dimer product was obtained because of a fast extraction of the Cg product from the ionic liquid phase, with the minimization of consecutive reaction to give trimers. Among a number of weak base buffers, a chinoline was chosen. The catalyst performance was compared with that in toluene. The catalyitc TOF at 90°C in toluene was... 

An immediate objection to this scheme is that it is difficult to believe that general base catalysis, particularly by so weak a base as water, should be necessary for the addition of water to a protonated ester. In other words, the entropically more favourable bimolecular addition... 

The demonstration that the mechanism of catalysis may change to general base catalysis for weakly basic nucleophiles further complicates the interpretation of such plots. The most useful generalizations that can be extracted from the data for aryl acetates are illustrated in Fig. 18. This is a plot of data for the reactions of oxyanions with three esters, phenyl, 4-nitrophenyl, and 2,4-dinitrophenyl acetates under the same conditions. Only nucleophiles showing normal reactivity are included points for hydro, de ion and a-effect nucleophiles have been excluded. The data are those of Jencks and Gilchrist283, who published a slightly different version of this plot. 

Kivinen proposes that the neutral hydrolysis of acetic anhydride is promoted by water acting as a weak base. The solvent isotope effect, kH20lkDl0 — 3, is suggestive of general base catalysis. 

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