In chemistry, solvolysis is a type of nucleophilic substitution (SN1/SN2) or elimination where the nucleophile is a solvent molecule.[1] Characteristic of SN1 reactions, solvolysis of a chiral reactant affords the racemate. Sometimes however, the stereochemical course is complicated by intimate ion pairs, whereby the leaving anion remains close to the carbocation, effectively shielding it from an attack by the nucleophile. Particularly fast reactions can occur by neighbour group participation, with nonclassical ions as intermediates or transition states.