Why is ether used as the solvent during Grignard reactions?
2 Answers
Ether is used as a solvent because it is aprotic and can solvate the magnesium ion.
Explanation:
A Grignard reaction involves the reaction of an alkyl (or aryl halide) with magnesium metal to form an alkylmagnesium halide.
Diethyl ether is an especially good solvent for the formation of Grignard reagents for two reasons.
(a) Ether is an aprotic solvent
The
The Grignard carbon is highly basic and reacts with the acidic protons of polar solvents like water to form an alkane.
Ether has no acidic protons, so Grignard reagents are stable in ether.
(b) Ether is a great solvating agent
The
Hence, it is difficult to form a Grignard reagent in a nonpolar solvent.
The
Thus, Grignard reagents are soluble in ether.
the very simple reason is that in ether, there is no acidic Hydrogen present on which the Grignard reagent
Explanation:
thus to prevent Grignard from decomposing simply to an alkane/ene/yne, we use ether.