Nucleophilic Substitution Reactions

In the following posts, we will learn about and do many practice problems on Nucleophilic Substitution Reactions. Nucleophilic Substitution Reactions are one of the most important major classes of organic chemistry and essential that you build a solid foundation and understanding of their principles and mechanisms such as the S_N1 and S_N2 reactions.

We will start from the introduction and general features of Nucleophilic Substitution Reactions and go in detail individually for the S_N1 and S_N2 mechanism. Each practice problem is designed to address the specifics of these mechanisms; the reactivity, stereochemistry and possibility of rearrangements. For example, you will have many practice problem examples that demonstrate in detail the inversion of R and S configuration during S_N2 reactions. On the other hand, we will also see why a racemic mixture is obtained when the reaction goes by the S_N1 mechanism via the formation of a carbocation intermediate.

One important and yet overwhelming questions in Nucleophilic Substitution Reactions is the prediction of the mechanism as to whether it is S_N1 or S_N2. And we will talk about how to choose between S_N1 and S_N2 considering the nucleophile, the substrate, the solvent, and the reaction conditions. Once you have sufficient knowledge, we will so do the retrosynthetic analysis of Nucleophilic Substitution Reactions to learn the best of choosing a reagent for functional group transformations.