REACTIVITY OF 3,6-DIMETHOXY-3,6-DIMETHYLCYCLOHEXA-1,4-DIENE: NUCLEAR VERSUS BENZYLIC NUCLEOPHILIC SUBSTITUTION

Article abstract of DOI:10.1016/S0040-4020(01)89773-8

The treatment of cis/trans-3,6-dimethoxy-3,6-dimethylcyclohexa-1,4-diene (ca. 1/1 mixture; easily prepared electrochemically in multigram scale from p-xylene) under acidic conditions (acetic, trifluoroacetic, sulfuric, or a Lewis acid) yields almost exclusively 2-methoxy-1,4-dimethylbenzene 4, through a trasposition reaction.The use of aqueous hydrochloric or hydrofluoric acid gives 2,5-dimethylphenol 12, and with hydrogen chloride a mixture of 2- and α-chloro-p-xylene (13, 14) is isolated.Different oxygen-, nitrogen-, and sulfur-containing nucleophiles (alcohols,thiols, or hydrazoic acid) react with 3 under acid catalysis giving the corresponding products resulting from a nuclear or/ and benzylic substitution on p-xylene (15 - 20).The reaction of compound 3 with organolithium reagents affords exclusively benzylic products 21 in a regiospecific manner.In all cases the mixtures of isomers are separated by column chromatography.The lithiation of compound 3 with lithium powder or lithium naphthalenide fails, giving p-xylene.A probable mechanism is proposed for the studied reactions.