I think (hope Victor confirm it or not) is to ensure that de KCN doesn't act as a base with water, so that basic medium help to keep the CN deprotonated with negative charge to serve as a nucleophile (English is not my native language, sorry if make some mistakes)
To keep media basic and prevent ⊖CN reacting with water which would mess up with the nucleophilicity of the cyanide. This reaction is from the old dissertation I found in the library. And as far as I remember, the presence of a weak base improved yield a little but was not, strictly speaking, necessary for the reaction to occur.
Thanks for sharing this
My pleasure! I love fun mechanisms like this one!
Really mind-blowing mechanism 🤯, thanks for sharing and explain it
What is the name of this reaction?
It doesn't really have a name, it's just an epoxide opening which cascades into more steps...
Why was potassium carbonate used in this reaction?
I think (hope Victor confirm it or not) is to ensure that de KCN doesn't act as a base with water, so that basic medium help to keep the CN deprotonated with negative charge to serve as a nucleophile (English is not my native language, sorry if make some mistakes)
To keep media basic and prevent ⊖CN reacting with water which would mess up with the nucleophilicity of the cyanide. This reaction is from the old dissertation I found in the library. And as far as I remember, the presence of a weak base improved yield a little but was not, strictly speaking, necessary for the reaction to occur.
🤔🤔