Abstract
Nucleophilic displacement reactions X- + CH3Y → CH3 X + Y- were studied in the gas phase [X- = OH-(H2O)n or CH3O-(CH3OH)n; Y = Cl or Br] under conditions of variable temperature (200-500 K) in a flow reactor and of variable translational energy in a beam apparatus. In both cases, the solvation number of the ionic reactant was varied: 0 ≤ n ≤ 3. Topics treated include the competition between nucleophilic displacement and proton transfer, the use of solvate as a stereochemical marker to probe mechanism, and the comparison between the gas phase and the solution of the reaction thermodynamics and kinetics.