Question #5a145
2 Answers
It is a real pain in the burro...
Explanation:
Wurtz coupling occurs when an alkyl halide undergoes carbon-carbon bond formation by the formation of alkyl or hydrocarbyl radicals by treatment with an alkali metal....
...the radicals can couple to give
Because it is a radical reaction, the reaction can be highly indiscriminate, and the radical, a HIGHLY reactive species, can rearrange, could react with the solvent if one is used, and could be hard to control. But when it works, it works....and you don't need fancy reagents.
Wrurtz reaction is issued to prepare symmetric or coupled alkanes using alkyl halides.
Explanation:
2 moles of alkyl halides on reaction with sodium in dry ether yield alkanes.
The reaction:
2 RX+sodium/dry ether ---> R-R + 2NaX
Here X is Cl or Br. We don't use alkyl flourides because the reaction is very exothermic. We also don't use alkyl iodides because the reaction is quite slow.
Note: methane,propane,pentane... etc cannot be prepared using this method. Only symmetric alkanes can be prepared.
