Synthesis and characterization of organophosphine/phosphite stabilized N-silver(I) succinimide: crystal structure of [(Ph3P)3·AgNC4H4O2]

Alkylation of Isatins with Trichloroacetimidates

N-Alkylation of isatins can be achieved utilizing trichloroacetimidate electrophiles and a Lewis acid catalyst. These reactions provide access to N-alkyl isatins, versatile scaffolds which are often employed in the synthesis...

The Reactivity of Ambident Nucleophiles: Marcus Theory or Hard and Soft Acids and Bases Principle?

The model reactions CH₃ X + (NH-CH=O)M ➔ CH₃ -NH-NH═O or NH═CH-O-CH₃  + MX (M = none, Li, Na, K, Ag, Cu; X = F, Cl, Br) are investigated to demonstrate the feasibility of Marcus theory and the hard and soft acids and bases (HSAB) principle in predicting the reactivity of ambident nucleophiles. The delocalization indices (DI) are defined in the framework of the quantum theory of atoms in molecules (QT-AIM), and are used as the scale of softness in the HSAB principle. To react with the ambident nucleophile NH═CH-O^- , the carbocation H₃ C⁺ from CH₃ X (F, Cl, Br) is actually a borderline acid according to the DI values of the forming C…N and C…O bonds in the transition states (between 0.25 and 0.49), while the counter ions are divided into three groups according to the DI values of weak interactions involving M (M…X, M…N, and M…O): group I (M = none, and Me₄ N) basically show zero DI values; group II species (M = Li, Na, and K) have noticeable DI values but the magnitudes are usually less than 0.15; and group III species (M = Ag and Cu(I)) have significant DI values (0.30-0.61). On a relative basis, H₃ C⁺ is a soft acid with respect to group I and group II counter ions, and a hard acid with respect to group III counter ions. Therefore, N-regioselectivity is found in the presence of group I and group II counter ions (M = Me₄ N, Li, Na, K), while O-regioselectivity is observed in the presence of the group III counter ions (M = Ag, and Cu(I)). The hardness of atoms, groups, and molecules is also calculated with new functions that depend on ionization potential (I) and electron affinity (A) and use the atomic charges obtained from localization indices (LI), so that the regioselectivity is explained by the atomic hardness of reactive nitrogen atoms in the transition states according to the maximum hardness principle (MHP). The exact Marcus equation is derived from the simple harmonic potential energy parabola, so that the concepts of activation free energy, intrinsic activation barrier, and reaction energy are completely connected. The required intrinsic activation barriers can be either estimated from ab initio calculations on reactant, transition state, and product of the model reactions, or calculated from identity reactions. The counter ions stabilize the reactant through bridging N- and O-site of reactant of identity reactions, so that the intrinsic barriers for the salts are higher than those for free ambident anions, which is explained by the increased reorganization parameter Δr. The proper application of Marcus theory should quantitatively consider all three terms of Marcus equation, and reliably represent the results with potential energy parabolas for reactants and all products. For the model reactions, both Marcus theory and HSAB principle/MHP principle predict the N-regioselectivity when M = none, Me₄ N, Li, Na, K, and the O-regioselectivity when M = Ag and Cu(I). © 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

O-Regioselective Synthesis with the Silver Salt Method

The excellent O-regioselectivity of the glycosidation of the ambident 2-O-substituted 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) via the silver salt method is computationally investigated at the MP2/6-311++G(2d,p):DZP//B3LYP/6-31+G(d):DZP level of theory. The reactions studied are those between 1-bromo-1-deoxy-2,3,4,6-tetra-O-acetyl-α-d-glucopyranose and the silver salts of 5-FU, 2-O-butyl-5-FU, and 2-O-benzyl-5-FU. Two pathways are considered as follows: (A) one where the silver and bromide ion do not interact, and (B) another where the silver and bromide ion interact in the transition states. Because the O-reaction barriers are much lower (by 13.3-22.2 kcal/mol) than N-reaction barriers in both pathways, the O-regioselectivity of the silver salt method can be satisfactorily explained by either path A or path B. Furthermore, path B, where Ag and Br interact consistently, has lower activation barriers than the corresponding path A (by 6.8-17.4 kcal/mol) in both N- and O-reactions. This computational result can be attributed to the following reasons: (1) the speeding-up effect in Koenigs-Knorr reactions due to the addition of silver carbonate into the reaction mixture; (2) the halogens being pulled away by silver ions from halides, as proposed by Kornblum and co-workers; and (3) the oxocarbenium ion involvement in the glycosidation reactions. The large energy difference between N- and O-transition states originates from the association between Ag and N-(O-) of the ambident unit (-N3-C4=O4) that shows significant covalent character so that the O-reaction transition states of the silver salt method benefit from favorable ionic interaction (C+···O-) and favorable covalent interaction (Ag···N). These two favorable interactions are in agreement with the hard and soft acids and bases principle; the former is a hard-hard interaction and the latter is a soft-soft interaction.

Farewell to the HSAB treatment of ambident reactivity

The concept of hard and soft acids and bases (HSAB) proved to be useful for rationalizing stability constants of metal complexes. Its application to organic reactions, particularly ambident reactivity, has led to exotic blossoms. By attempting to rationalize all the observed regioselectivities by favorable soft-soft and hard-hard as well as unfavorable hard-soft interactions, older treatments of ambident reactivity, which correctly differentiated between thermodynamic and kinetic control as well as between different coordination states of ionic substrates, have been replaced. By ignoring conflicting experimental results and even referring to untraceable experimental data, the HSAB treatment of ambident reactivity has gained undeserved popularity. In this Review we demonstrate that the HSAB as well as the related Klopman-Salem model do not even correctly predict the behavior of the prototypes of ambident nucleophiles and, therefore, are rather misleading instead of useful guides. An alternative treatment of ambident reactivity based on Marcus theory will be presented.