In this project supported by the Organic Dynamics Program, Professor John L. Kice, in the Chemistry Department at the University of Denver, will study the "Mechanisms of Reactions of Organosulfur and Selenium Compounds". This project will increase our knowledge of the mechanisms of a variety of organosulfur and selenium reactions and will benefit those studying the biological role of sulfur and selenium and the biochemistry of sulfur and selenium. This project will be concerned with the study of the mechanism of key reactions of sulfenic and selenenic acids which are important and ubiquitous reactive intermediates in the chemistries of their respective elements. Another phase of the project will pursue additional avenues of investigation of elimination reactions leading to the formation of sulfines, and a third phase will explore in a systematic way the scope and dependence on reaction variables of a facile cleavage reaction of alpha-sulfonyl sulfides by nucleophiles. The project will involve a search for more definitive evidence for the presence of hypervalent sulfur intermediates on the reaction coordinate of nucleophilic substitutions at sulfur using reactions of oxyanions with selected thiosulfinates and thiosulfonates.
