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CHEM 125b - Lecture 27 - Triphenylmethyl and an Introduction to Carbonyl Chemistry

Painstaking studies of his “hexaphenylethane” and its reactivity convinced Gomberg that he had prepared the first trivalent carbon compound, triphenylmethyl radical, the discovery of which marked the emergence of fundamental organic chemistry in America. Isotopic labeling could decide whether protonated cyclopropane plays a role in Friedel-Crafts alkylation. C-13 NMR spectra of aldehydes and ketones show how characteristic chemical shifts are established empirically. The carbonyl group is thermodynamically stable but kinetically reactive.

CHEM 125b - Lecture 26 - Aromatic Substitution in Synthesis: Friedel-Crafts and Moses Gomberg

The Friedel-Crafts reaction creates new alkyl- or acyl-aromatic bonds, with or without cation rearrangement. Designing reaction sequences, especially those involving diazonium intermediates, so as to access a wide variety of substituted benzenes provides a good introduction to the challenges of synthetic organic chemistry. Aromatic rings with strong electron withdrawal can undergo nucleophilic aromatic substitution, which plays an important role in biochemistry.

CHEM 125b - Lecture 25 - C-13 and 2D NMR – Electrophilic Aromatic Substitution

Proton decoupling simplifies C-13 NMR spectra. Dilute double labeling with C-13 confirmed the complex rearrangement scheme in steroid biosynthesis. Two-dimensional NMR yields correlations between NMR signals that underlie structural determination of proteins and identification of the mechanism of a rapid carbocation rearrangement. Substitution of an electrophile for a proton on an aromatic ring proceeds by a two-step association-dissociation mechanism involving a cyclohexadienyl cation intermediate.

CHEM 125b - Lecture 24 - Higher-Order Effects, Dynamics, and the NMR Time Scale

Because spin-spin splitting depends on electron spin precisely at a nucleus, splitting by a C-13 depends on its orbital’s hybridization. “Higher-order effects” that give complex multiplets for nuclei with similar chemical shifts can be understood in terms of the mixing of wave functions of similar energy. Averaging of chemical shifts or spin-spin splitting may be used to measure the rate of rapid changes in molecular structure, such as changes in conformation or hydrogen bonding. Since the spectroscopic time scale depends on frequency differences, averaging is easier in NMR than in IR.

CHEM 125b - Lecture 23 - Diamagnetic Anisotropy and Spin-Spin Splitting

Through-space interaction between magnets of fixed strength and orientation averages to zero during random molecular tumbling, suggesting that the local field about a proton should be sensitive only to electrons that orbit about itself. The chemical shift can be sensitive to electrons orbiting elsewhere if the amount of orbiting varies with molecular orientation. This “diamagnetic anisotropy” is commonly used to rationalize the unusual chemical shifts of protons in acetylene and in aromatic and antiaromatic compounds.

CHEM 125b - Lecture 22 - Medical MRI and Chemical NMR

Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) requires gradients in the applied magnetic field, while chemical nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) requires a highly uniform field. When protons in different parts of the body can be driven to broadcast different frequencies, tomography allows reconstructing a three-dimensional image showing water location. Dependence of the signal intensity on relaxation allows BOLD functional MRI that shows brain activity.

CHEM 125b - Lecture 21 - Functional Groups and Fingerprints in IR Spectroscopy; Precession of Magnetic Nuclei

Infrared spectroscopy provides information for analyzing molecular structure and for understanding bonding and dynamics. Although the normal modes of alkanes involve complex coordinated vibration of many atoms, the unusual strengths of multiple bonds give alkenes and alkynes distinctive stretching frequencies. The intensity of characteristic out-of-plane C-H bending peaks allows assignment of alkene configuration.

CHEM 125b - Lecture 20 - Electronic and Vibrational Spectroscopy

Time-dependent quantum mechanics shows how mixing orbitals of different energy causes electrons to vibrate. Mixing 1s with 2p causes a vibration that can absorb or generate light, while mixing 1s with 2s causes “breathing” that does not interact with light. Many natural organic chromophores involve mixing an unshared electron pair with a vacant pi orbital, whose conjugation determines color. Infrared spectra reveal atomic vibration frequencies, which are related by Hooke’s law to bond strengths and “reduced” masses.

CHEM 125b - Lecture 19 - Aromatic Transition States: Cycloaddition and Electrocyclic Reactions

Cyclic conjugation that arises when p-orbitals touch one another can be as important for transition states as aromaticity is for stable molecules. It is the controlling factor in “pericyclic” reactions. Regiochemistry, stereochemistry, and kinetics show that two new sigma bonds are being formed simultaneously, if not symmetrically, in the 6-electron Diels-Alder cycloaddition. Although thermal dimerization of thymine residues in DNA is forbidden, photochemistry allows the 4-electron cycloaddition.

CHEM 125b - Lecture 18 - Linear and Cyclic Conjugation Theory; 4n+2 Aromaticity

Despite the substantial change in the energy of individual orbitals, the overall pi-electron energy and orbital shape changes little upon linear conjugation of two double bonds. Conjugation energy of polyenes and allylic systems may be predicted by means of a semicircle mnemonic. The much greater stabilization in “aromatic” conjugated rings, and Hückel’s 4n+2 rule, derive from alternating stabilization and destabilization of successive orbitals when the ends of a conjugated chain overlap as it is closed to form a ring. A circle mnemonic predicts orbital energies for conjugated rings.

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