Kinetic Evidence for the Formation of Discrete 1,4-Dehydrobenzene Intermediates. Trapping by Inter- and Intramolecular Hydrogen Atom Transfer and Observation of High-Temperature CIDNP

Article abstract of DOI:10.1021/ja00404a018

Upon being heated, alkyl-substituted cis-1,2-diethynyl olefins undergo cyclization to yield reactive 1,4-dehydrobenzenes; the products isolated may be derived from either unimolecular or bimolecular reactions of the intermediate. (Z)-4,5-Diethynyl-4-octene (4) undergoes rearrangement to yield 2,3-di-n-propyl-1,4-dehydrobenzene (17).Solution pyrolysis of 4 in inert aromatic solvent produces three unimolecular products, (Z)-dodeca-4,8-diyn-6-ene (7), benzocyclooctene (9), and o-allyl-n-propylbenzene (10), in high yield.When 1,4-cyclohexadiene is added to the pyrolysis solution as a trapping agent, high yields of the reduced product o-di-n-propylbenzene (12) are obtained.The kinetics of solution pyrolysis of 4 in the presence and absence of trapping agent establish that 2,3-di-n-propyl-1,4-dehydrobenzene is a discrete intermediate on the pathway leading to products.When the reaction was run in the heated probe of an NMR spectrometer, CIDNP was observed in 10.This observation, along with kinetic and chemical trapping evidence, indicates the presence of two additional intermediates, formed from 17 by squential intramolecular <1,5>hydrogen transfer, on the pathway to products.The observation of CIDNP, coupled with the reactivity exhibited by 17 and the other two intermediates, implicates a biradical description of these molecules.Biradical 17 has been estimated to have a lifetime of about 10^-9 s at 200 deg C and to lie in a well of about 5 kcal per mole with respect to the lowest energy unimolecular pathway (<1,5> hydrogen transfer).Ring opening (expected to be the lowest energy process for 1,4-dehydrobenzenes in which intramolecular hydrogen transfer is unlikely) to the isomeric diethynyl olefin 7 appears to have an activation enthalpy of about 10 kcal/mol.Upon thermal reaction in the gas phase (400 deg C) or in solution in inert solvents (Z)-2,3-diethylhexa-1,5-diyn-3-ene (5) rearranges in good yield to the isomeric diethynyl olefin (Z)-deca-3,7-diyn-5-ene (8) again presumably via 2,3-diethyl-1,4-dihydrobenzene 20 (addition of 1,4-cyclohexadiene to the reaction solution leads to a good yield of o-diethylbenzene, the expected trapping product of biradical 20).The absence of products due to intramolecular <1,4> hydrogen transfer indicates that this process is at least 1 or 2 orders of magnitude slower than <1,5> hydrogen transfer in 17.At 500 deg C in the gas phase products due to <1,4> hydrogen transfer begin to appear.