Saturday, October 21, 2017

Just to be sure, can we go over why cumulated is more stable than isolated? (Cumulated dienes are less stable than isolated, because they have fewer sigma-pi conjugations. - GS).

I’m still a little confused on why benzene will not react with bromine without a catalyst but cyclohexene will react readily without one? (This is an excellent demonstration of lower activity of aromatic compounds due to their stability. - GS).

Is the a difference in the mechanism of bromination and nitration? (Yes, only on the step of the electrophile preparation, which also leads to a different by-product. - GS).

Friday, October 20, 2017


What is an Allylic Carbon/Carbocation? (It is a carbon bonded to a C=C bond and everything (positive charge, atoms) attached to that carbon. If that C=C bond is a part of an aromatic ring, the term switches to “benzylic”. - GS).

Tuesday, October 10, 2017


Can you please review how the strength of a nucleophile/base is affected by the solvent? (In a protic solvent, nucleophilicity increases as the size of the nucleophilic atom increases. In aprotic solvents and in vacuum, nucleophilicity follows the trend of basicity. - GS).

If HCl is involved in an SN1 reaction, is free radical propagation is needed? (No. It is a 2 step non-chain reaction: http://ochem.orgfree.com/sn1.html  - GS).
When talking about acidity and basicity of alcohols, does the equilibrium shift towards the stronger acid? (No. It is shifted from a stronger acid to a weaker acid. - GS).