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A singlet carbene contains an empty p orbital and a roughly sp 2 hybrid orbital that has two electrons. Singlet carbenes add stereospecifically to alkenes, and alkene stereochemistry is retained in the cyclopropane product. [1] The mechanism for addition of a carbene to an alkene is a concerted [2+1] cycloaddition (see figure).
Carbene addition to alkenes. Singlet and triplet carbenes exhibit divergent reactivity. [11] [page needed] [12] Triplet carbenes are diradicals, and participate in stepwise radical additions. Triplet carbene addition necessarily involves (at least one) intermediate with two unpaired electrons.
Cyclopropanation is also stereospecific as the addition of carbene and carbenoids to alkenes is a form of a cheletropic reaction, with the addition taking place in a syn manner. For example, dibromocarbene and cis -2-butene yield cis -2,3-dimethyl-1,1-dibromocyclopropane, whereas the trans isomer exclusively yields the trans cyclopropane.
Dichlorocarbene reacts with alkenes in a formal [1+2]cycloaddition to form geminal dichlorocyclopropanes. These can be reduced to cyclopropanes or hydrolysed to give cyclopropanones by a geminal halide hydrolysis. Dichlorocyclopropanes may also be converted to allenes in the Skattebøl rearrangement.
The addition of singlet carbenes to alkenes is stereospecific in that the geometry of the alkene is preserved in the product. For example, dibromocarbene and cis-2-butene yield cis-2,3-dimethyl-1,1-dibromocyclopropane, whereas the trans isomer exclusively yields the trans cyclopropane. [4]
The configuration of the product is determined by the trajectory of approach of the olefin to the metal carbene. In reactions of monosubstituted metal carbenes with terminal olefins, the olefin likely approaches "end-on" (with the carbon-carbon double bond of the olefin nearly parallel to the metal-carbon double bond of the carbene) with the olefin R group pointed away from the substituent of ...
A transition metal carbene complex is an organometallic compound featuring a divalent carbon ligand, itself also called a carbene. [1] Carbene complexes have been synthesized from most transition metals and f-block metals , [ 2 ] using many different synthetic routes such as nucleophilic addition and alpha-hydrogen abstraction. [ 1 ]
In this reaction type either the two carbenic intermediates react or a carbenic intermediate reacts with a carbene precursor. [1] An early pioneer was Christoph Grundmann reporting on a carbene dimerisation in 1938. [2] In the domain of persistent carbenes the Wanzlick equilibrium describes an equilibrium between a carbene and its alkene.