In the previous post, I looked at the mechanism for 1,4-nucleophilic addition to an activated alkene (the Michael reaction). The model nucleophile was malonaldehyde after deprotonation and the model electrophile was acrolein (prop-2-enal), with the rate determining transition state being carbon-carbon bond formation between the two, accompanied by proton transfer to the oxygen of the acrolein.
Archive for the ‘Curly arrows’ Category
Substituent effects on the mechanism of Michael 1,4-Nucleophilic addition.
Sunday, March 29th, 2020The Graham reaction: Deciding upon a reasonable mechanism and curly arrow representation.
Monday, February 18th, 2019Students learning organic chemistry are often asked in examinations and tutorials to devise the mechanisms (as represented by curly arrows) for the core corpus of important reactions, with the purpose of learning skills that allow them to go on to improvise mechanisms for new reactions. A common question asked by students is how should such mechanisms be presented in an exam in order to gain full credit? Alternatively, is there a single correct mechanism for any given reaction? To which the lecturer or tutor will often respond that any reasonable mechanism will receive such credit. The implication is that a mechanism is “reasonable” if it “follows the rules”. The rules are rarely declared fully, but seem to be part of the absorbed but often mysterious skill acquired in learning the subject. These rules also include those governing how the curly arrows should be drawn.† Here I explore this topic using the Graham reaction.[1]‡
References
- W.H. Graham, "The Halogenation of Amidines. I. Synthesis of 3-Halo- and Other Negatively Substituted Diazirines1", Journal of the American Chemical Society, vol. 87, pp. 4396-4397, 1965. http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/ja00947a040
A curly-arrow pushing manual
Wednesday, December 4th, 2013I have several times used arrow pushing on these blogs. But since the rules for this convention appear to be largely informal, and there appears to be no definitive statement of them, I thought I would try to produce this for our students. This effort is here shared on my blog. It is what I refer to as the standard version; an advanced version is in preparation. Such formality might come as a surprise to some; arrow-pushing is often regarded as far too approximate to succumb to any definition, although it is of course often examined.
Experimental evidence for “hidden intermediates”? Epoxidation of ethene by peracid.
Sunday, August 25th, 2013The concept of a “hidden intermediate” in a reaction pathway has been promoted by Dieter Cremer[1] and much invoked on this blog. When I used this term in a recent article of ours[2], a referee tried to object, saying it was not in common use in chemistry. The term clearly has an image problem. A colleague recently sent me an article to read (thanks Chris!) about isotope effects in the epoxidation of ethene[3] and there I discovered a nice example of hidden intermediates which I share with you now.
References
- E. Kraka, and D. Cremer, "Computational Analysis of the Mechanism of Chemical Reactions in Terms of Reaction Phases: Hidden Intermediates and Hidden Transition States", Accounts of Chemical Research, vol. 43, pp. 591-601, 2010. http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/ar900013p
- H.S. Rzepa, and C. Wentrup, "Mechanistic Diversity in Thermal Fragmentation Reactions: A Computational Exploration of CO and CO2 Extrusions from Five-Membered Rings", The Journal of Organic Chemistry, vol. 78, pp. 7565-7574, 2013. http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/jo401146k
- T. Koerner, H. Slebocka-Tilk, and R.S. Brown, "Experimental Investigation of the Primary and Secondary Deuterium Kinetic Isotope Effects for Epoxidation of Alkenes and Ethylene withm-Chloroperoxybenzoic Acid", The Journal of Organic Chemistry, vol. 64, pp. 196-201, 1999. http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/jo981652x
Mechanistic arrow pushing. A proposed addition to its rules.
Wednesday, June 12th, 2013A little while ago, I set out some interpretations of how to push curly arrows. I also appreciate that some theoretically oriented colleagues regard the technique as neither useful nor in the least rigorous, whereas towards the other extreme many synthetically minded chemists view the ability to push a reasonable set of arrows for a proposed mechanism as of itself constituting evidence in its favour.[1] Like any language for expressing ideas, the tool needs a grammar (rules) and a vocabulary, and perhaps also an ability to carry ambiguity. These thoughts surfaced again via a question asked of me by a student: “is the mechanism for the hydrogens in protonated benzene whizzing around the ring a [1,2] or a [1,6] pericyclic sigmatropic shift?”.
References
- M.J. Gomes, L.F. Pinto, P.M. Glória, H.S. Rzepa, S. Prabhakar, and A.M. Lobo, "N-heteroatom substitution effect in 3-aza-cope rearrangements", Chemistry Central Journal, vol. 7, 2013. http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1752-153X-7-94
How is the bromination of alkenes best represented?
Sunday, October 14th, 2012I occasionally delve into the past I try to understand how we got to our present understanding of chemistry. Thus curly arrow mechanistic notation can be traced back to around 1924, with style that bifurcated into two common types used nowadays (on which I have commented and about which further historical light at the end of this post). Here I try to combine these themes with some analysis of wavefunctions for a particularly troublesome reaction to represent, the dibromination of an alkene, which I represented in the previous post as shown below.
Curly arrow pushing: another reality check.
Sunday, August 5th, 2012Two years ago, I discussed how curly arrow pushing is taught, presenting four different ways of showing the arrows. One of the comments posted to that blog suggested that all of the schemes shown below were deficient in one aspect.
The first ever curly arrows. And now for something completely different.
Saturday, July 21st, 2012The discussion appended to the post on curly arrows is continued here. Recollect the curly arrow diagram (in modern style) derived from Robinson’s original suggestion:
The first curly arrows…lead to this?
Friday, July 20th, 2012Little did I imagine, when I discovered the original example of using curly arrows to express mechanism, that the molecule described there might be rather too anarchic to use in my introductory tutorials on organic chemistry. Why? It simply breaks the (it has to be said to some extent informal) rules! Consider the dimerisation of nitrosomethane (in fact a well-known equilibrium).
