All Organic Chemistry Resources
Example Questions
Example Question #561 : Organic Chemistry
Which of the following would reduce 2-butyne into cis-2-butene?
Only would produce the desired product. would produce a trans alkene, would produce an alkane, and would produce an alcohol.
Example Question #33 : Hydrocarbon Reactants
What is the major product of the given reaction?
1.
2.
3.
All are possible, depending acidic, basic, or neutral conditions
Here, we have a terminal alkyne reacting with what appears to be a very complicated and overwhelming set of reagents. This set of reagents, however, are simply used in the oxidation of pi bonds (in a reaction called hydroboration oxidation). In the process, and are added with anti-Markovnikov regioselectivity to either side of the alkyne. As a result, we get an enol as an intermediate (enol: an alcohol directly bonded to an alkene).
If the reaction would have stopped here, answer choice would have been the correct answer. However, enols are very unstable and easily tautomerize. In this case, the enol tautomerizes into an aldehyde to give us answer choice as our major final product.
Example Question #1 : Help With Alkyne Reactions
Which of the following sequences of reagents will produce the product from the starting material as shown below?
, Lindlar's
, Lindlar's
, Lindlar's
The formation of the halohydrin occurs when adding in the presence of water. This reaction adds anti to an alkene, which means that the alkene must be in cis configuration. That only happens when hydrogenating using Lindlar's catalyst.
Example Question #562 : Organic Chemistry
What is the final product of the reaction shown?
I
III
II
V
IV
III
First step: elimination
Second step: Addition of two bromines across the double bond
Third step: Double dehydrohalogenation to form the alkyne, and removal of alkyne hydrogen (deprotonation)
Fourth step: methylation reaction (SN2)
Fifth step: metal-ammonia reduction forms trans alkene product
Example Question #5 : Help With Alkyne Reactions
What is the product of the reaction below?
and
The reaction shown is a metal-ammonia reduction of a terminal alkyne. This reduction will turn an alkyne into its corresponding trans alkene (however, since this alkyne is terminal, there is no cis/trans stereochemistry around the resulting alkene).
Note: the metal-ammonia reduction uses sodium metal and liquid ammonia (, ), and is a reagent should NOT be confused sodium amide () which is also used on alkyne reagents, but will result in a different product (, shown).
Example Question #3 : Help With Alkyne Reactions
What is the product of the reaction shown?
This reaction is how one would typically alkylate a terminal alkyne. The first step is to turn the alkyne into a good nucleophile. This is done by removing the hydrogen on the alkyne using sodium amide (, shown). The second step is an reaction where the alkyne anion is used as a nucleophile to attack an alkyl halide (iodoethane in this case). This nucleophilic substitution reaction will generated the necessary carbon-carbon bond. The answer is thus the one where two carbons (from the iodoethane) are attached via a sigma bond to the triple-bond-containing terminal carbon in the alkyne.
Example Question #1 : Help With Aldehyde And Ketone Reactions
What is the product of the reaction between 2-butanone and lithium aluminum hydride?
3-butanol
Butane
None of these
2-butanol
3-butanone
2-butanol
Lithium aluminum hydride is a reducing agent. It reduces ketones and carboxylic acids to alcohols. 2-butanone is a 4-carbon chain with a double bond between an oxygen and carbon 2. The reduction turns the double bond with oxygen into a single bond to a hydroxy group. This makes the product 2-butanol.
Example Question #2 : Help With Aldehyde And Ketone Reactions
Choose the appropriate starting compound based on the reaction conditions and major product shown in the figure.
Either I or II
I only
III only
II only
IV only
IV only
In the presence of a strong base and benzene, ethylene glycol will convert ketones to acetals as seen in the product shown above. The given reagents will not react with esters or alcohols. The only given compound containing a ketone is molecule IV, the correct answer. This type of reaction is useful in organic synthesis when reaction at an ester is desired, but a ketone must be protected from reacting simultaneously. The acetal formed is often called a protecting group and may be reversed by addition of acid.
Example Question #1 : Carbonyl Reactants
Which of the labeled hydrogens in the given molecule is the most acidic?
A
C
D
B
C
This question is asking what the most acidic hydrogen is in an aldehyde. To identify the most acidic hydrogen, we'll need to consider which conjugate base will be the most stable after the loss of hydrogen. When the alpha-hydrogen is lost, the resulting carbanion will be the most stabilized due to resonance with the adjacent carbonyl group. This resonance helps to distribute the negative charge on the carbanion over a greater area, which contributes to the greater stability of this conjugate base. Abstraction of a hydrogen from any of the other position would result in a carbanion that could not participate in resonance and thus would not be as stable.
Example Question #1 : Carbonyl Reactants
What is the product of the given reaction?
This is a Grignard reagent carbon-carbon bond forming reaction. This reaction is being used with an ester which goes through a ketone intermediate with requires a second attack form the organolithium to reduce to an alcohol. Esters and acyl chlorides go to an alcohol with two of the same R groups from the organolithium in a Grignard reaction. This structure fits the bill:
Certified Tutor