Electrochemical Hydrogenation of Substituted α-Phenylvinylphosphonic Acids: General Characteristics of the Reaction Layer and Prediction of Preparative Electrolysis Conditions

Abstract

The conditions for electrochemical hydrogenation and anodic oxidation of α-phenylvinylphosphonic acid and its 4-chloro- and 4-methyl-substituted derivatives on palladized platinum electrodes in aqueous sulfuric-acid solutions are found. It is shown that, in the system under study, the products of strong chemisorption are not the intermediates of the electrocatalytic hydrogenation. The reactant molecules are modeled by quantum-chemical methods in terms of the restricted Hartree–Fock approximation. The calculated charge distributions in reactant molecules are used for estimating the electrostatic components of works of approach and the orientation distributions in the reaction layer.