Kinetic effects induced by cellulose on water-catalyzed reactions. Hydrolysis of 2,4-dinitrophenyl cellulose xanthate and some sugar xanthate ester analogues

The hydrolysis of 2,4-dinitrophenyl cellulose xanthate (CelXDNP) was studied in 10% v/v aqueous ethanol at 25°C and μ = 0.1 (KCl). The water-catalyzed hydrolysis showed that, as for p-nitrobenzyl cellulose xanthate, it occurs through two parallel reactions with rate constants k'H2O = 4.40 x 10-3 s-1 for the fast hydrolysis, and k''H2O = 6.90 x 10-5 s-1 for the slow hydrolysis. The entropy of activation of the fast hydrolysis was 0.7 ± 1.8 cal K-1 mol-1. External nucleophiles such as hydroxide and simple amines show simple first-order kinetics. The spontaneous hydrolysis of CelXDNP in acetone-water mixtures indicates that the fast reaction does not occur through water polymers and that for water molarity higher than 30 M there are no acetone molecules (or very few) in the highly ordered cybotactic region of cellulose. The spontaneous hydrolysis of methyl 4,6-O-benzylidene- α -D-glucopyranoside 3-(S-p-nitrobenzyl-xanthate) although is faster than the 6-isomer, it is slower than the fast hydrolysis of p-nitrobenzyl cellulose xanthate (CelXNB). Also Δ Sdouble dagger is highly negative (-41.0 cal K-1 mol-1), as it is for alkyl and sugar analogues. Only for the fast hydrolyses of CelXDNP and CelXNB is the entropy of activation almost zero. It is concluded that there is no neighbouring OH effect on the fast hydrolysis of cellulose xanthate esters. Key words: hydrolysis, water catalysis, cellulose xanthate esters, methyl glucose, xanthate esters, neighbouring OH effect.