Question

Treatment of alkyl halides with alc. AgNO2 mainly nitroalkanes while that with aq. NaNO2 mainly alkyl nitrites explain. Why ?

Answer 1

Answer:

Nitrite needs silver for this because it's not all that good a nucleophile. On treating ethanolic solution of nitroalkane with silver nitrite (Ag−O−N=O), nitroalkane is formed because since the bond between Ag−O is covalent, the lone pair on nitrogen acts as an attacking site for nucleophilic substitution.।।