Is there substituent cross-interaction effect in all the conjugated systems containing C[dbnd]N polar bond? The substituent effects on the NMR chemical shifts of 2,5-disubstituted pyrimidines

Abstract

The substituent cross-interaction effect in the substituted benzylidene anilines (p-XC6H4CHNC6H4Y-p) has been observed and widely investigated. In order to investigate whether the substituent cross-interaction effect exist in all the conjugated systems containing CN polar bond, this paper employed 2-X-5-Y pyrimidines as the model compounds for study. The influences of substituents X and Y on the 1H NMR and 13C NMR chemical shifts of 2, 5-disubsitituted pyrimidines have been systematically investigated. Quantitative structure-chemical shifts relationship models have been built for δ(H4,6), δ(C2), δ(C4,6) and δ(C5) with four to six molecular descriptors. These models were confirmed of good stability and predictive performances by leave-one-out cross validation. This study indicates that the substituent effects of 2,5-disubstituted pyrimidines are much more complex than that of the substituted benzylidene anilines. More structural factors besides of Hammett parameter should be taken into consideration. Different from the substituted benzylidene anilines, the cross-interaction effect (Δσ2) of substituents X and Y has little contribution to δ(H4,6), δ(C2), δ(C5) and δ(C4,6) of 2,5-disubstituted pyrimidines.