Competitive dynamics of E2 and SN2 reaction driven by collision energy and leaving group.

The competition between E2 and SN2 reactions is essential in organic chemistry. In this paper, the reaction mechanism of F- + CH3CH2Cl is investigated utilizing direct dynamics simulations, and unravel how the collision energy (Ecoll) and the leaving group affect the competition between SN2 and E2 in the F- + CH3CH2Y (Y = Cl and Br) reactions. Simulation results for F- + CH3CH2Cl reaction show that the anti-E2 channel is dominant, but with the increase of Ecoll from 0.04 to 1.9 eV the branching ratio of the anti-E2 pathway significantly decreases by 21%, and the SN2 pathway becomes more important. A transition from indirect to direct reaction has been revealed when Ecoll is increased from 0.04 to 1.90 eV. At lower Ecoll, a large ratio of indirect events occurs via a long-lived hydrogen-bonded complex, and as the collision energy is increased, the lifetimes of the hydrogen-bonded complexes are shortened, due to an initial faster relative velocity. The simulation results of F- + CH3CH2Cl are further compared with the F- + CH3CH2Br reaction at Ecoll of 0.04 eV. Changing the leaving group from Cl to Br drastically suppresses the indirect events of anti-E2 with a branching ratio decreasing from 0.46 to 0.36 due to the mass effect, and promotes direct rebound mechanism resulting from a looser transition state geometry caused by varied electronegativity.

Effects of Methyl Substitution and Leaving Group on E2/SN2 Competition for Reactions of F- with RY (R = CH3, C2H5, iC3H7, tC4H9; Y = Cl, I).

The competition between base-induced elimination (E2) and bimolecular nucleophilic substitution (SN2) is of significant importance in organic chemistry and is influenced by many factors. The electronic structure calculations for the gas-phase reactions of F- + RY (R = CH3, C2H5, iC3H7, tC4H9, and Y = Cl, I) are executed at the MP2 level with aug-cc-pVDZ or ECP/d basis set to investigate the α-methyl substitution effect. The variation in barrier height, reaction enthalpy, and competition of SN2/E2 as a function of methyl-substitution and leaving group ability has been emphasized. And the nature of these rules has been explored. As the degree of methyl substitution on α-carbon increases, the E2 channel becomes more competitive and dominant with R varying from C2H5, iC3H7, to tC4H9. Energy decomposition analysis offers new insights into the competition between E2 and SN2 processes, which suggests that the drop in interaction energy with an increasing degree of substitution cannot compensate for the rapid growth of preparation energy, leading to a rapid increase in the SN2 energy barrier. By altering the leaving group from Cl to I, the barriers of both SN2 and E2 monotonically decrease, and, with the increased number of substituents, they reduce more dramatically, which is attributed to the looser transition state structures with the stronger leaving group ability. Interestingly, ∆E0‡ exhibits a positive linear correlation with reaction enthalpy (∆H) and halogen electronegativity. With the added number of substituents, the differences in ∆E0‡ and ∆H between Y = Cl and I likewise exhibit good linearity.

Nucleophile Effects on the E2/SN2 Competition for the X- + CH3CH2Cl Reactions: A Theoretical Study.

The effect of nucleophiles on the gas-phase E2/SN2 competition is still not completely elucidated, despite its importance in chemistry. In the current work, the electronic structure calculations of prototypical reactions X- + CH3CH2Cl (X = OH, F, Cl, Br, and I) are performed at the MP2 level with aug-cc-pVDZ or ECP/d. The effects of nucleophiles on the competing E2 and SN2 reactions in terms of the correlation between the barrier height and reaction energy, electronegativity of X, bond length, charge distribution, and proton affinity of anionic nucleophile X- are explored and emphasized. As the nucleophile changes from OH- to I-, both SN2 and E2 reactions become more exothermic, with the reaction energy in the ranges from -51.9 to 10.8 kcal mol-1 (SN2) and -36.8 to 38.0 kcal mol-1(E2). For X- = F- and OH-, the sequence of reactivity for the four pathways is ret-SN2 < syn-E2 < anti-E2 ∼ inv-SN2. However, for X- = Cl-, Br-, and I-, the anti-E2 barrier is much higher in energy (17.1-29.4 kcal mol-1) than that of inv-SN2. Energy decomposition analysis illustrates that the anti-E2 pathway possesses the highly destabilizing characteristic distortion, resulting in a larger reaction barrier and hence becoming a more unfavorable pathway than inv-SN2. More interestingly, only ion-dipole complex exists in the entrance channel for reactions involving OH-, Cl-, Br-, and I-, and in contrast, a significant hydrogen-bonded complex formation is also revealed for X- = F-, which can further affect E2/SN2 competition and atomic-level mechanisms, especially, for the isoelectronic nucleophile F- and OH-. It has been revealed here that electronegativity of central atoms in X and ionic radii of nucleophiles are the important factors affecting the entrance channel complex.

Functional Regulation of ZnAl-LDHs and Mechanism of Photocatalytic Reduction of CO2: A DFT Study.

Defect engineering and heteroatom doping can significantly enhance the activity of zinc-aluminum layered double hydroxides (ZnAl-LDHs) in photocatalytic CO2 reduction to fuel. However, the in-depth understanding of the associated intrinsic mechanisms is limited. Herein, we systematically investigated Zn vacancies (VZn), oxygen vacancies (VO), and Cu doping on the geometry and electronic structure of ZnAl-LDH using density functional theory (DFT). We also revealed the related reaction mechanism. The results reveal the concerted roles of VO, VZn, and doped-Cu facilitate the formation of the unsaturated metal complexes (Znδ+-VO and Cuδ+-VO). They can localize the charge density distribution, function as new active centers, and form the intermediate band. Simultaneously, the intermediate band of functionalized ZnAl-LDHs narrows the band gap and lowers the band edge location. Therefore, it can broaden the absorption range of light and improve the selectivity of CO. Additionally, the unsaturated metal complex lowers the Gibbs free energy barrier for effective CO2 activation by bringing the d-band center level closer to the Fermi level. The work provided guidance for developing LDH photocatalysts with high activity and selectivity.

Reaction mechanism conversion induced by the contest of nucleophile and leaving group.

Direct dynamic simulations have been employed to investigate the OH- + CH3Cl reaction with the chosen B3LYP/aug-cc-pVDZ method. The calculated rate coefficient for the bimolecular nucleophilic substitution reaction (SN2), 1.0 × 10-9 cm3 mol-1 s-1 at 300 K, agrees well with the experimental result of (1.3-1.6) × 10-9 cm3 mol-1 s-1. The simulations reveal that the majority of the SN2 reactions are temporarily trapped in the hydrogen-bonded complex at Ecoll = 0.89 kcal mol-1. Importantly, the influences of the leaving group and nucleophile have been discussed by comparisons of X- + CH3Y (X = F, OH; Y = Cl, I) reactions. For the X = F- reactions, the reaction probability of SN2 increases along the increased leaving group ability Cl < I, suggesting that the thermodynamic factor plays a key role. The indirect mechanisms were found to be dominant for both reactions. In contrast, for X = OH-, the fraction of SN2 drops with the enhanced leaving group ability. In particular, a dramatic transition occurs for the dominant atomic reaction mechanisms, i.e., from complex-mediated indirect to direct, implying an interesting contest between the leaving group and the nucleophile and the importance of the dynamic factors, i.e., the dipole moment, steric hindrance, and electronegativity.

Direct dynamics in a proton transfer reaction of isomer product competition. Insight into the suppressed formation of the isoformyl cation.

Proton transfer between HOCO+ and CO produces the formyl cation HCO+ and isoformyl cation HOC+ isomers initiating multiple astrochemical reaction networks. Here, the direct chemical dynamics simulations are performed to uncover the underlying atomistic dynamics of the above reaction. The simulations reproduce the measured product energy and scattering angle distributions and reveal that the reaction proceeds predominantly through a direct stripping mechanism which results in the prominent forward scattering observed in experiments. The reaction dynamics show propensity for the HCO+ product even at a collision energy larger than the threshold for HOC+ formation. This is a consequence of the larger opacity and impact parameter range for HCO+. In accordance with the revealed direct mechanistic feature, the reaction can be controlled by orienting the reactants into a reactive H-C orientation that also favors HCO+ formation. Considering the lack of equilibrated reactant complexes and the on the fly migration of the proton, the CO2-catalyzed isomerization is assumed to have insignificant impact on the isomer ratios. This work provides insights of dynamical effects besides energetics into the interesting finding of strongly suppressed formation of the metastable isoformyl cation for related proton transfer reactions in the measurements.