Determining if a molecule is a nucleophile

[Julianne Seog 3K]

I was looking through the course reader, and noticed that in the list of nucleophiles, the majority of molecules that are classified as nucleophiles were overall a negative charge and positive for electrophiles. Are there any molecules that have a negative charge that is not and nucleophile/ positive charge that is not a electrophile that we should be aware of?

[Karan Ishii 3E]

No, at least in this course even if there might be some wack rare compound that does that.
Remember that negative charge or partial negative charge repels other negatively charged things. There would be little attraction between positive charges that would result in a reaction unless perhaps theres a lot of steps involved with the overall reaction.

[EmilyLeibovitch2E]

I thought the rule was that if there is a partial negative or full negative, no matter what it is a nucleophile. For an electrophile, if there is a partial positive or full positive it is always an electrophile. Is this correct?

[parisnortega1]

A nucleophile typically has one electron pair and is negatively charged or neutral. Such examples include H2O, -OMe, or -OtBu. The species with a lot of electrons is a nucleophile overall. Generally speaking, electrophiles are positively charged or neutral organisms with vacant orbitals that are drawn to a particle center.

[marcelnajjar]

I was looking through the course reader, and noticed that in the list of nucleophiles, the majority of molecules that are classified as nucleophiles were overall a negative charge and positive for electrophiles. Are there any molecules that have a negative charge that is not and nucleophile/ positive charge that is not a electrophile that we should be aware of?

A nucleophile has one electron pair and is negatively charged or neutral electrophiles are positively charged or neutral