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Grignard Reaction: History
Please note this is an old version of this entry, which may differ significantly from the current revision.
Subjects: Chemistry, Organic
Contributor: Helena Kang

Organomagnesium halides (Grignard reagents, RMgX) add to polarized multiple bonds, most classically to aldehydes and ketones, to form a new carbon–carbon bond and, after hydrolysis, an alcohol. The reagent is prepared from an organic halide and magnesium metal; in solution it exists as a Schlenk equilibrium among RMgX, R2Mg, and MgX2, and the addition step is nucleophilic transfer of the organic group to the electrophilic carbon [1]. The same organomagnesium species alkylate or arylate other electrophiles, including epoxides, esters (with double addition), carbon dioxide, and activated carbon–halogen or carbon–fluorine sites on extended π systems such as fluorographene [2]. Sequential Staudinger/aza-Wittig/Grignard sequences use the addition to an in situ imine as the C–C-forming step toward iminosugars [3]. The concept is bounded as the reactivity of the C–Mg bond toward electrophiles. Transition-metal-catalyzed coupling of Grignard reagents (Kumada coupling) is a related but distinct process in which the elementary C–C bond-forming step occurs at the metal, not by direct polar addition of RMgX to a carbonyl [1].

  • Grignard reaction
  • organomagnesium reagents
  • nucleophilic addition
  • carbon–carbon bond formation

Synthetic Organic Chemistry Methods • Organic Chemistry • Chemistry • Physical Sciences

References

  1. Raphael Mathias Peltzer; Jürgen Gauss; Odile Eisenstein; Michele Cascella; The Grignard Reaction – Unraveling a Chemical Puzzle. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2020, 142, 2984-2994, 10.1021/jacs.9b11829.
  2. Demetrios D. Chronopoulos; Aristides Bakandritsos; Petr Lazar; Martin Pykal; Klára Čépe; Radek Zbořil; Michal Otyepka; High-Yield Alkylation and Arylation of Graphene via Grignard Reaction with Fluorographene. Chem. Mater. 2017, 29, 926-930, 10.1021/acs.chemmater.6b05040.
  3. Manuel Zoidl; Andres Gonzalez Santana; Ana Torvisco; Christina Tysoe; Aloysius Siriwardena; Stephen G. Withers; Tanja M. Wrodnigg; The Staudinger/aza-Wittig/Grignard reaction as key step for the concise synthesis of 1-C-Alkyl-iminoalditol glycomimetics. Carbohydr. Res. 2016, 429, 62-70, 10.1016/j.carres.2016.04.006.
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