A [5]HELOL analogue that senses remote chirality in alcohols, phenols, amines, and carboxylic acids

Like water, alcohols are weak acids and bases. This is attributed to the polarization of the O–H bond making the hydrogen partially positive. Moreover, the electron pairs on the oxygen atom of alcohol make it both basic and nucleophilic. Protonation of an alcohol converts hydroxide, a poor leaving group, into water—a good one. The two acid–base equilibria corresponding to ethanol are depicted below.

Protons bonded to heteroatoms such as nitrogen and oxygen exhibit a range of chemical shift values. This is due to the varying degree of hydrogen bonding between the proton and the heteroatom in other molecules. The extent of hydrogen bonding affects the electron density around the proton, thereby giving different chemical shift values for the protons in the proton NMR spectrum.
The –OH proton in alcohols typically appears in the range of δ 2 to 5 ppm but can vary depending on the specific...

Infrared spectroscopy, also known as vibrational spectroscopy, is mainly used to determine the types of bonds and functional groups in molecules. In aldehydes and ketones, the carbonyl (C=O) bond shows an absorption around 1710 cm-1. The C=O bond vibration of an aldehyde occurs at lower frequencies than that of a ketone. In addition to the C=O absorption in an aldehyde, the aldehydic C–H bond also gives two peaks in the 2700–2800 cm-1 range. This absorption, coupled with the C=O stretching, is...

In aldehydes, the hydrogen atom connected to the carbonyl carbon helps distinguish aldehydes from other carbonyl compounds using ¹H NMR spectroscopy. The closeness of aldehydic hydrogen to the electrophilic carbonyl carbon highly deshields the hydrogen atom causing its signal to appear around 10 ppm in the ¹H NMR spectra. α hydrogens split the aldehydic proton signal, which helps identify the number of α hydrogens in the molecule. For instance, one α hydrogen creates a doublet for an aldehydic...

Replacing each alpha-hydrogen in chloroethane by bromine (or a different functional group) yields a pair of enantiomers. Such protons are called prochiral or enantiotopic and are related by a mirror plane. Enantiotopic protons are chemically equivalent in an achiral environment. Because most proton NMR spectra are recorded using achiral solvents, enantiotopic hydrogens yield a single signal.
In chiral compounds such as 2-butanol, replacing the methylene hydrogens at C3 produces a pair of...

In proton NMR spectroscopy, primary amines and secondary amines showcase their N–H protons as a broad signal in the chemical shift range between δ 0.5 and 5 ppm. The exact position in this range depends on several factors, including sample concentration, hydrogen bonding, and the type of solvent used. Since amine protons undergo fast proton exchange in solution, the protons are labile and therefore do not participate in any splitting with adjacent protons. Thus, the observed peak is broad and...