Synthetic and mechanistic aspects of the reactions between bromodifluoromethyltriphenylphosphonium bromide and dibromofluoromethyltriphenylphosphonium bromide and trialkylphosphites

Bromofluoromethyltriphenylphosphonium bromides react with trialkylphosphites in two distinct ways. Bromodifluoromethyltriphenylphosphonium bromide undergoes a rapid exchange reaction with trialkylphosphites to give the corresponding bromodifluoromethylphosphonates in good to excellent yields. A similar exchange reaction also occurred with an analogous diethoxyphenylphosphonite to give the corresponding ethoxyphenylphosphinate. Mechanistically, the exchange process involves the formation of difluorocarbene via dissociation of the intermediate difluoromethylene ylide, capture of the difluorocarbene by the trialkylphosphite to give , which captures bromine followed by dealkylation to the product, bromodifluoromethylphosphonate. The equilibria involved in the multi-step mechanism are all shifted to the phosphonate product by the final dealkylation step. In contrast, the dibromofluoromethyltriphenylphosphonium bromide does not under exchange reactions with trialkylphosphite. The phosphite serves as a halophilic reagent to abstract Br from the dibromofluoromethylphosphonium salt to generate the bromofluoromethylene ylide, which can easily be trapped in situ with aldehydes or ketones to give good yields of the E/Z-bromofluoroalkenes. No dissociation of the bromofluoromethylene ylide was observed.     

Synthetic and mechanistic aspects of halo-F-methylphosphonates

The synthesis of a variety of new halo-F-methylphosphonates has been achieved by a Michaelis-Arbuzov type reaction between a halo-F-methane and a trialkyl phosphite. This synthesis has proved to be of wide scope and utility for the high yield preparation of a number of heretofore unknown compounds. The ¹H, ¹⁹F, ¹³C and ³¹P NMR spectroscopic properties are reported in detail. The mechanism for the formation of bromodifluoromethylphosphonates has been shown to proceed through the intermediacy of difluorocarbene:CF₂. The phosphonate products have been shown to react with a wide variety of reagents. Fluoride and alkoxide ions react by attack at phosphorus with cleavage of the carbon-phosphorus bond and formation of [:CF₂] from the bromodifluoromethylphosphonates and the CFBr₂⁻ anion from the dibromofluoromethylphosphonates. Iodide ion and tertiary phosphines react by attack at the ester carbon to give stable phosphonate salts. Hydrolysis of the phosphonate esters with 50% aqueous HCl gives the expected phosphonic acids. Trimethylsilyl bromide attacks phosphoryl oxygen to afford the bis(trimethylsilyl) esters.