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Introduction

Why the choice of a book dedicated to “nitroalkanes”? Usually a generic molecule containing the nitro group is called “nitro compound”; however there are three different typologies of nitro compounds, with distinct chemical behaviors (Figure 1): (i) aromatic nitro compounds, subjected to electrophilic substitution, (ii) conjugated nitroalkenes that, due to the presence of an electrophilic carbon in β-position, are exposed to nucleophilic addition, and (iii) nitroalkanes that, under basic conditions, act as nucleophiles due to the presence of an acidic proton germinal to the nitro group, providing the formation of C—C bond with electrophiles.

Figure 1 Three different typologies of nitro compounds.

Thus, since the studies dedicated to the chemistry of nitroalkanes and their application in organic synthesis are growing year after year in the last two decades, this category of molecules has proven to be one of the most valuable and versatile collection of substances in organic synthesis. Consequently, this book is dedicated exclusively to this class of molecules.

However, as the chemistry of nitroalkanes is constantly expanded, this book should not be considered as “the book” of nitroalkanes but just “the first” (after the pioneering Ono’s book [1]) of a series dedicated to this class of molecules.

Reference

1 1 Ono, N. (2001). The Nitro Group in Organic Synthesis. Wiley-VCH. ISBN 0-471-31611-3.