Are hydrogenation of Alkenes (to form alkanes) and hydration of alkenes (to form alcohols) electrophilic addition reactions. I’ve seen different things about this online and the OCR spec groups all of the Alkenes reactions as ‘addition reactions’.
Are hydrogenation of Alkenes (to form alkanes) and hydration of alkenes (to form alcohols) electrophilic addition reactions. I’ve seen different things about this online and the OCR spec groups all of the Alkenes reactions as ‘addition reactions’.
Yes these would be, it’s addition as you are only adding atoms to the alkene, not removing any to do this, and it’s electrophilic as they are electron pair acceptors.
Yes these would be, it’s addition as you are only adding atoms to the alkene, not removing any to do this, and it’s electrophilic as they are electron pair acceptors.
The hydrogenation reaction of alkenes to alkanes is not electrophilic addition. In hydrogenation, a nickel catalyst and hydrogen gas is used (and no electrophile is involved), and there is a different mechanism taking place. This mechanism involves adsorption of the alkene to the surface of the nickel catalyst, so it weakly forms bonds with the nickel catalyst which allows hydrogen to be added to the molecule. It is still an addition reaction, but is not electrophilic addition.
In terms of hydration, there is electrophilic addition involved.
In step one, a proton from the phosphoric acid catalyst acts as the electrophile and accepts a lone pair from the C=C double bond, forming a carbocation intermediate.