Availability and reactivity of concentrated dimethyldioxirane solutions in solvents other than acetone

Four to five-fold increase in concentration or the possibility of isolation in ''acetone-free'' medium has become possible for dimethyldioxirane solutions in CH2Cl2, CHCl3, CCl4 and CFCl3 by employing a simple work-up procedure which involved washings with phosphate buffer. This procedure allowed the kinetics of the epoxidation of cis-stilbene to be studied and which were shown to follow a simple second order rate law for all solvents studied. The relative reaction rates were as follows: acetic acid > CHCl3 > acetone > CCl4 > toluene > ethyl acetate. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd.