Kinetics and Mechanism of the Decarboxylation of Pyrrole-2-carboxylic Acid in Aqueous Solution

The decarboxylation of pyrrole-2-carboxylic acid in aqueous buffers at 50° and ionic strength 1.0 has been found to be first order with respect to substrate at a fixed pH. As the pH is decreased, the rate constant increases slightly in the pH range 3–1, then rises rapidly from pH 1 to 10 M HCl. The 13C-carboxyl kinetic isotope effect is 2.8% in 4 M HClO4 and negligible at pH ~ 3. These observations can be accounted for by a mechanism, previously proposed for the decarboxylation of anthranilic acid, in which the species undergoing decarboxylation is the carboxylate ion protonated at the 2-position of the pyrrole ring. This intermediate can be formed both by ring-protonation of the carboxylate anion and by ionization of the ring-protonated acid. At low acidities ring-protonation is rate determining, but at higher acidities the rate of protonation exceeds that of decarboxylation.