Sodium telluride, prepared by heating tellurium and sodium hydride in a 1:2 molar ratio in dry N,N-dimethylformamide, readily debrominates a bromoacetic ester at low temperatures to generate an enolate anion, which undergoes a Reformatsky-type reaction with various non-enolizable aldehydes to give the corresponding α,β-unsaturated esters in good to moderate yields. Ketones remain almost unaffected under the same conditions.
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Suzuki et al. (1986) studied this question.
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