Why is phenol more reactive in electrophilic aromatic substitutions?
1 Answer
The phenyl ring is activated by delocalization of the lone pairs of oxygen around the ring........
Explanation:
Benzene normally requires Lewis acid activation for electrophilic aromatic substitution; for instance, bromination of the
By constrast, when phenol is treated with bromine, presumably because of the donation of
At any rate, there is nothing I can say here that you won't learn better than from your organic chemistry text. Read the chapters on electrophilic aromatic substitution, and digest their account.