Ch 12 Radicals Flashcards
Alkanes are saturated hydrocarbons:
they do not contain any carbon-carbon double or triple bonds
Alkanes are unreactive compounds because they have
only strong sigma-bonds and atoms with no partial charges
In heterolytic bond cleavage:
a bond breaks so that one of the atoms retains both of the bonding electrons
In homolytic bond cleavage:
a bond breaks so that both of the atoms retains one of the bonding electrons
Alkanes undergo radical substitution reactions with
chlorine or bromine at high temperatures or in the presence of light to form alkyl chlorides of alkyl bromides
Radical chain reaction steps:
initiation, propagation, termination
the rate determining step of a radical substitution reaction is
removal of a hydrogen atom to form an alkyl radical
The relative stabilities of radicals and their relative rates of formation;
3° > 2° > 1° > methyl
Calculation of the relative amounts of products obtained from the radical halogenation of an alkane must take into an account
both the probability of and the relative rate at which a particular radical is formed
the reactivity-selectivity principle states that
the more reactive a species is the less selective it will be
a bromine radical is less reactive than a chlorine radical
so a bromine radical is more selective about which hydrogen atom it removes
Ethers form explosive peroxides when
they are exposed to air
A peroxide is a radical initiator because it creates
radicals
Radical addition reactions are chain reactions with
initiation, propagation, and termination steps
A peroxide reverses the order of H and Br to an alkene because it causes
bromide radical instead of the H+ to be the electrophile.