Cobalt hydride

A special kind of oxidative addition occurs between phosphine cobalt hydride complexes and boron halides ... 

The main aim of this review is to survey the reactions by which the Co—C bond is made, broken, or modified,.and which may be used for preparative purposes or be involved in catalytic reactions. Sufficient evidence is now available to show that there exists a general pattern of reactions by which the Co—C bond can be made or broken and in which the transition state may correspond to Co(III) and a carbanion (R ), Co(II) and a radical (R-), Co(I) and a carbonium ion (R ), or a cobalt hydride (Co—H) and an olefin. Reactions are also known in which the organo ligand (R) may be reversibly or irreversibly modified (to R ) without cleavage of the Co—C bond, or in which insertion occurs into the Co—C bond (to give Co—X—R). These reactions can be shown schematically as follows ... 

A mechanism was proposed in which entry into the catalytic cycle is achieved via Et2AlCl-mediated cobalt hydride generation. Diene hydrometallation affords the cobalt-complexed -jr-allyl A-5, which inserts the tethered alkene to furnish intermediate B-4. Elimination of LnCoOBn provides the cyclization product. Reduction of LnCoOBn by Et2AlCl regenerates cobalt hydride to complete the catalytic cycle (Scheme 17). 

E,E)-1,3-Dienes. A cobalt hydride prepared from these three reagents (1 4 1) in THF at -20° converts 1-alkynes into (E,E)-1,3-dienes ... 

The first step of the reduction by cobalt(II) chloride and NaBH4 involves the production of cobalt hydride species which is capable of exchanging hydrogen ligands with the medium. The second step is a hydrometallation reaction followed by a reductive cleavage of the carbon-cobalt bond. The hydrocobaltation seems to be reversible, as indicated by deuterium label incorporation93. 

Figure 7.3 gives an overview of the reactions involved in the hydroformylation of internal alkenes to linear products. It has been suggested that cobalt, once attached to an alkene, runs along the chain until an irreversible insertion of CO occurs. Thus, the alkene does not dissociate from the cobalt hydride during the isomerisation process. There is no experimental support for a clear-cut proof for this mechanism. In alkene polymerisation reactions this type of chain running has been actually observed. 

Most likely the cobalt catalyst is HCo(CO)2(L), which has a very electron rich metal centre and dissociation of CO does not occur under the reaction conditions. The first step is a reaction of the cobalt hydride with ethylene oxide forming a hydroxyethylcobalt species, which does not require dissociation of... 

As recently reported, cobalt-catalyzed addition of olefins to butadiene is probably an example of the addition of cobalt alkyls to butadiene (106). The catalyst was the type prepared by reaction of cobalt chloride with an aluminum alkyl in the presence of a diene. A bis-7r-allylcobalt derivative is probably formed. The unstable 7r-allylcobalt compounds probably decompose (reversibly) into cobalt hydride. The hydride would add to the olefin present to form a dialkyl, which could then add again to the diene. 

Styrene derivatives can be selectively converted to the corresponding benzyl alcohols by molecular oxygen in the presence of bis(dimethylglyoximato)chloro(pyridine)cobalt(III) and sodium tetrahydroborate (equation 242).559 A likely mechanism for this reaction involves insertion of the alkene into the cobalt-hydride bond, followed by 02 insertion into the cobalt-carbon bond, as in equation (11), and decomposition of the peroxide adduct (168) to the ketone, which is reduced to alcohol by NaBH4 (equation 243). 

A somewhat similar oxidation of terminal alkenes to methyl ketone and alcohol by 02 in the presence of Co(salMDPT) [salMDPT = bis(salicylideneiminopropyl)methylamine] and in ethanol solvent has recently been reported by Drago and coworkers (equation 244).560 Only terminal alkenes were found to be reactive with this catalytic system. The reaction is alcohol dependent and occurs in ethanol and methanol but not in t-butyl or isopropyl alcohols. The alcohol is concomitantly oxidized during the reaction, and may act as a coreducing agent and/or favor the formation of cobalt hydride. This oxidation might occur according to the mechanism of equation (243). 

Of the mononuclear complexes perhaps the most interesting are [IrCls]3 and the complex cobalt hydrides since in both cases cyclic reactions have been observed. For [IrCl6]3-, hydrogen and chlorine are formed on irradiation with 254 nm light, apparently by processes involving free radicals (equations 8-15).70 The photochemical excitation probably involves L-M charge transfer. 

Indeed the cobalt hydride disproportionates to Co" and hydrogen and at high conversions the addition is suppressed because cobalt(II) couples with starting radicals (to regenerate the starting complex). This is one reason why excess alkene is required. Hydrocobaltation of the acceptor by the cobalt hydride intermediate can also cause problems, see W. M. Bandaranayake and G. Pattenden, J. Chem. Soc., Chem. Commun., 1988, 1179. 

The most important feature of organocobalt cyclizations is that a variety of functionalized products can be obtained, depending on the nature of the substrate and the reaction conditions. The most common transformation has been formation of an alkene by cobalt hydride elimination. Alkenes are often formed in situ during the photolysis, and with activated alkene acceptors the formation of these products by cobalt hydride elimination is very facile. Scheme 31 provides a representative example from the work of Baldwin and Li.143 The alkene that is formed by cobalt hydride elimination maintains the correct oxidation state in the product (54) for formation of the pyrimidone ring of acromelic acid. Under acidic conditions, protonation of the cyclic organocobalt compound may compete 144 however, if protonated products are desired, the cyclization can probably be conducted by the reductive method with only catalytic quantities of cobalt (see Section 4.2.2.2.2). 

The metal carboxylate insertion mechanism has also been demonstrated in the dicobaltoctacarbonyl-catalyzed carbomethoxylation of butadiene to methyl 3-pentenoate.66,72 The reaction of independently synthesized cobalt-carboxylate complex (19) with butadiene (Scheme 8) produced ii3-cobalt complex (20) via the insertion reaction. Reaction of (20) with cobalt hydride gives the product. The pyridine-CO catalyst promotes the reaction of methanol with dicobalt octacarbonyl to give (19) and HCo(CO)4. 

The mechanism of the reaction of the alcohol (or water) with the acyl complex to produce ester (or acid) and regenerate the cobalt hydride complex is not known. Because the reaction of the analogous manganese complex with alcohols is known to proceed through a hemiacetal-like complex, this mechanism has been written for the carboxylation reaction (equation 42). 

Sodium borohydride (160) was found to serve as a hydrogen donor in the asymmetric reduction of the presence of an a,pi-unsaturated ester or amide 162 catalyzed by a cobalt-Semicorrin 161 complex, which gave the corresponding saturated carbonyl compound 163 with 94-97% ee [93]. The [i-hydrogen in the products was confirmed to come from sodium borohydride, indicating the formation of a metal enolate intermediate via conjugate addition of cobalt-hydride species (Scheme 2.17). 

Figure 24. Eosin-conjugated cobalt myoglobin. The photoexcited eosin moiety reduces the cobalt(II) porphyrin and allow the reactive cobalt-hydride, H-Co(III)Mb.

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