Dimethylbutadiene, formally referred to as 2,3-dimethyl-1,3-butadiene, is an organic compound with the formula (CH3)2C4H4. It is colorless liquid which served an important role in the early history of synthetic rubber. It is now a specialty reagent.
In 1909, Fritz Hofmann and a team working at Bayer succeeded in polymerizing dimethylbutadiene. It was then called methyl isoprene because it has one more methyl group than isoprene. Their polymer was the first synthetic rubber.[5] The polymer had a number of deficiencies relative to natural rubber.[6] The Bayer synthesis of dimethylbutadiene involved the dehydration of pinacol, as described above.[4]
Reactions
Dimethylbutadiene readily undergoes Diels-Alder reactions and reacts faster than 1,3-butadiene. Its effectiveness in this reaction is attributed to the stabilization of the cis-conformation owing to the influence of the methyl groups on the C2 and C3 positions.
References
^Haynes, W. M.; Lide, D. R. (2012). CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics 93rd Ed. CRC Press/Taylor and Francis. ISBN978-1439880494.