Radical cations are reactive chemical intermediates that have been used in the past to accomplish important and novel chemical transformations. Recently, there has been an increasing interest in the reactions of radical cations owing to advances in controlling and understanding their reactivity, as well as a growing number of methodologies for their generation. In our study of electro-oxidatively generated radical cations, we have developed a series of competition experiments which may be used to investigate the relative reactivity of radical cations towards various nucleophiles. These experiments have produced mechanistic insights into the structure of transition states, the relative energies of the reaction intermediates, and the reversibility of radical cation reactions.

Competition experiments and other experimental probes for investigating the reactivity of radical cations

246th National Meeting (2013)

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