The vapour-phase catalytic transfer hydrogenation (CTH) of fifteen acyclic α,β-unsaturated carbonyl compounds, i.e. ten aldehydes and five ketones, with ethanol or 2-propanol as hydrogen donors has been studied over pure MgO as the catalyst. The obtained values of the yields of unsaturated alcohols (UOLs) have been used to calculate a normalized value called the relative directional reactivity (RDR). Among substituted α,β-unsaturated aldehydes transfer hydrogenated with ethanol only two of them have shown a lower reactivity (RDR_E < 1) than that noted for acrolein (for which RDR_E = 1), namely 3,3-dimethyl- and 2-phenylacrolein. It has been found that the introduction of an alkyl substituent into position 2 in an acrolein molecule as well as a phenyl group into position 3 leads to a distinct increase of an RDR_E value for such aldehydes. In contrast, very pronounced differences in relative directional reactivity values (RDR_P) for both α,β-unsaturated aldehydes and ketones have been observed when 2-propanol was used as the hydrogen donor. The ranges of the RDR_P values are: 0.45–2.52 and 0.04–1.71 for aldehydes and ketones, respectively. The proposed normalization procedure allowed us to obtain values which could be used to make meaningful conclusions as to the influence of the structure of α,β-unsaturated carbonyl compounds on their reactivity. Moreover, it was used to determine which of these compounds react in accordance with the thermodynamic description, and whose reactivity is kinetically controlled.

汽相催化转移氢化15无环α，β不饱和羰基化合物中，（CTH）即10醛和5吨酮，用乙醇或2-丙醇作为氢供体已被研究过的MgO纯作为催化剂。获得的不饱和醇（UOL）的产率值已用于计算归一化值，称为相对方向反应性（RDR）。在被乙醇氢化的取代的α，β-不饱和醛转移中，只有两个已显示出 比丙烯醛更低的反应性（RDR _E <1）（对此RDR _E ＝ 1），即3，3-二甲基-和2-苯基丙烯醛。已经发现，将烷基取代基引入丙烯醛分子的2位以及将苯基引入3位导致这些醛的RDR _E值明显增加。相反，当将2-丙醇用作氢供体时，已经观察到α，β-不饱和醛和酮的相对方向反应性值（RDR _P）的非常明显的差异。RDR _P的范围醛和酮的值分别为：0.45-2.52和0.04-1.71。拟议的归一化程序使我们能够获得一些值，这些值可用于就α，​​β-不饱和羰基化合物的结构对其反应性的影响做出有意义的结论。此外，它被用来根据热力学描述来确定这些化合物中的哪些反应，以及它们的反应性是动力学控制的。