Chemistry 324 - Spring 2008

Chemistry 324 is advanced half-unit course in organic chemistry. Chem 201/202 (or instructor’s consent) are prerequisites, which means 324 is normally taken by Reed College juniors and seniors majoring in chemistry.

The course emphasizes the following activities and topics:

• Using molecular modeling to study critical molecules in chemical reactions
• Learning to apply various rules (Woodward-Hoffmann, Fukui FMO, Dewar-Zimmerman) to the analysis of pericyclic* reactions
• Learning to read and understand the research literature

This year we will examine these reactions in detail: Diels-Alder, thermal and “click” 3+2 cycloadditions, thermal and photochemical 2+2 cycloadditions, 1,n-hydrogen migrations, Claisen and Ireland-Claisen rearrangements, and Cope, oxy-Cope, and anion oxy-Cope rearrangements. We will also explore a number of theories of chemical reactivity, including the Woodward-Hoffmann rules for conservation of orbital symmetry, Fukui’s Frontier MO theory, and the Dewar-Zimmerman rules for aromatic and antiaromatic transition states.

*A pericyclic reaction is one in which the transition state contains a cyclic array of forming and breaking bonds. Typical examples are cycloadditions (Diels-Alder), migrations and rearrangements (1,2-hydride shift), and electrocyclizations.