Reactivity of Cl-P(+)-Cl toward cyclic organic ethers

The dichlorophosphenium ion (Cl-P(+)-Cl) undergoes a variety of reactions with cyclic organic ethers in the gas phase in a Fourier-transform ion cyclotron resonance mass spectrometer. Most of the reactions are initiated by Cl-P(+)-Cl-induced heterolytic C-O bond cleavage. However, the observed final products depend on the exact structure of the ether. For saturated ethers, e.g., tetrahydropyran, tetrahydrofuran, and 2-methyltetrahydrofuran, the most abundant ionic product corresponds to hydroxide abstraction by Cl-P(+)-Cl. This unexpected reaction is rationalized by a multistep mechanism that involves an initial heterolytic C-O bond cleavage accompanied by a 1,2-hydride shift, and that ultimately yields a resonance-stabilized allyl cation and HOPCl2. The process is estimated to be highly exothermic (AM1 calculations yield delta H = -(33-38) kcal mol(-1) for the ethers mentioned above). However, the adducts formed from most of the unsaturated ethers are unable to undergo hydride shifts and hence cannot react via this pathway. In some of these cases, e.g., for 2,5-dihydrofuran and 2,5-dihydro-3,4-benzofuran, the C-O bond heterolysis is followed by oxygen/chlorine exchange to yield the O=PCl radical and a resonance-stabilized carbocation (AM1 calculations yield delta H = -14 kcal mol(-1) for the reaction of 2,5-dihydro-3,4-benzofuran). Hydride abstraction by Cl-P(+)-Cl also yields an abundant product for these two ethers. On the other hand, the ethers with low ionization energies, such as 2,3-dihydrofuran and 2,3-dihydrobenzofuran, react with Cl-P(+)-Cl by electron transfer. Finally, a unique pathway, addition followed by elimination of HCl, dominates the reaction with furan. The observed reactions are rationalized by thermochemical data obtained from semiempirical molecular orbital calculations.