Borane-metal complexes

Cyclic divinyl boranes (bora-2,5-cyclohexadienes) also act as good complex ligands and are available from the corresponding stannacyclohexadienes by treatment with PhBCl2. They react photochemically or thermically with transition-metal complexes, e.g. ... 

Neutral carboranes and boranes react with transition-metal complexes forming metallocarboranes or metalloboranes, respectively. However, most metallocarboranes and metalloboranes are prepared from transition-metal halides and anionic carborane and borane species ( 6.5.3.4) or by reacting metal atoms and neutral boranes and carboranes. These reactions are oxidative addition reactions ( 6.5.3.3). 

Various metal complexes catalyze the addition of catecholborane and pinacolbo-rane to aliphatic terminal alkenes (Table 1-2). Neither the borane reagents nor the catalysts alter the high terminal selectivity, but a titanium catalyst does (entry 3). Although Cp2TiMe2 [30] exhibits high terminal selectivity for vinylarenes, aliphatic alkenes afford appreciable amounts of internal products, whereas an analogous Cp 2Sm(THF) [31] allows selective addition of catecholborane to the terminal car-... 

As mentioned in the introduction, early transition metal complexes are also able to catalyze hydroboration reactions. Reported examples include mainly metallocene complexes of lanthanide, titanium and niobium metals [8, 15, 29]. Unlike the Wilkinson catalysts, these early transition metal catalysts have been reported to give exclusively anti-Markonikov products. The unique feature in giving exclusively anti-Markonikov products has been attributed to the different reaction mechanism associated with these catalysts. The hydroboration reactions catalyzed by these early transition metal complexes are believed to proceed with a o-bond metathesis mechanism (Figure 2). In contrast to the associative and dissociative mechanisms discussed for the Wilkinson catalysts in which HBR2 is oxidatively added to the metal center, the reaction mechanism associated with the early transition metal complexes involves a a-bond metathesis step between the coordinated olefin ligand and the incoming borane (Figure 2). The preference for a o-bond metathesis instead of an oxidative addition can be traced to the difficulty of further oxidation at the metal center because early transition metals have fewer d electrons. 

ALKYLALUMINIUM DERIVATIVES, ALKYLBORANES, ALKYLHALOBORANES ALKYLHALOPHOSPHINES, ALKYLHALOSILANES, ALKYLMETALS ALKYLNON-METAL HYDRIDES, ALKYLPHOSPHINES, ALKYLSILANES ARYLMETALS, BORANES, CARBONYLMETALS, COMPLEX ACETYLIDES COMPLEX HYDRIDES, HALOACETYLENE DERIVATIVES HEXAMETHYLNITRATODIALUMINATE SALTS, METAL HYDRIDES NON-METAL HYDRIDES, ORGANOMETALLICS, PYROPHORIC ALLOYS PYROPHORIC CATALYSTS, PYROPHORIC IRON-SULFUR COMPOUNDS PYROPHORIC METALS... 

The material reviewed in this Chapter hitherto has focused on metallacarboranes in which the metal atom is a vertex in an icosahedral cage framework. Until recently, monocarbollide metal compounds with core structures other than 12 vertexes were very rare since suitable carborane precursors were not readily available." However, Brellochs recent development of the reaction of decaborane with aldehydes to give 10-vertex monocarboranes permits a considerable expansion in this area of boron cluster chemistry. As a consequence, several intermediate-sized monocarboranes are now easily accessible and we have recently begun to exploit the opportunities that these present. In particular, we have focused thus far on complexes derived from the C-phenyl-substituted species [6-Ph- zJo-6-CBgHii] It is clear from these initial studies that a wealth of new chemistry remains to be discovered in this area, not only from among the metal derivatives of PhCBg car-boranes such as those discussed in this section, but also in the metal complexes of other newly available carboranes. 

Compounds of transition metal complexes possessing a nonbonding electron pair with boranes (BX3) can be regarded classically as boron complexes with a transition metal ligand. In a broader sense, however, boranes can be classified as acceptor ligands.154,155 Thus, coordination of a borane results in a decrease of the electron density on the metal atom. In the case of carbonyl complexes this effect is reflected in the increase, by 20-100 cm-1, of the CO stretching frequency.154-156 It follows from the foregoing that stable coordination of boranes is... 

Of commercial interest are benzo- and other fused aromatic 1,2,3-diazaborine derivatives which have exhibited good antibacterial activity against a variety of microorganisms (155—157). The reaction of pyrazole or C-substituted pyrazoles with boranes yields the pyrazabole system, a class of exceptionally stable compounds. More than 70 species in this system have been reported and the subject comprehensively reviewed (158). These compounds have been used as ligands in transition-metal complexes (159). 

In order to estimate and compare the magnitude of the M-B interactions in these isoelectronic complexes, a whole set of structural and spectroscopic parameters determined experimentally and/or computed theoretically were considered. This includes the M - B distance the ratio r between the M -B distance and the sum of covalent radii (to take into account the different sizes of the metals involved), the pyramidaliza-tion of the boron environment XB, the rlB NMR chemical shift <5 11B, the difference AqB between the charge at boron in the metal boratrane and the free ligand TPB, the difference A M between the charge at the metal in the metal boratrane and that in the related borane-free complex [M(i-Pr2PPh)3], and the NBO delocalization energy A NBo associated with the main donor-acceptor M-B interaction found at the second order in the NBO analysis (Table 2). Only the conclusions of this detailed analysis will be recalled here ... 

Since polynuclear complexes and cluster compounds are in general rather complicated species, the application of quantitative methods for describing bonding is not only difficult but also impractical. Qualitative approaches and empirical rules often play an important role in treating such cases. We have used the octet rule and bond valence to describe the structure and bonding of boranes and their derivatives (Sections 13.3 and 13.4). Now we use the 18-electron rule and bond valence to discuss the bonding and structure of polynuclear transition-metal complexes and clusters. 

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