Group 4 meta-metal bonds complexes

Functionalized benzenes preferentially induced ortho-para substitution with electron-donating groups and meta substitution with electron-withdrawing groups (see above). Additionally, the order of reactivity found with aromatics was similar to that of electrophilic aromatic substitution. These observations implicated an electrophihc metalation of the arene as the key step. Hence, Fujiwara et al. [4b] believed that a solvated arylpalladium species is formed from a homogeneous solution of an arene and a palladium(ll) salt in a polar solvent via an electrophilic aromatic substitution reaction (Figure 9.2). The alkene then coordinates to the unstable arylpalladium species, followed by an insertion into the aryl-palladium bond. The arylethyl-palladium intermediate then rapidly undergoes )8-hydride elimination to form the alkenylated arene and a palladium hydride species, which then presumably decomposes into an acid and free palladium metal. Later on, the formation of the arylpalladium species proposed in this mechanism was confirmed by the isolation of diphenyltripalladium(ll) complexes obtained by the C-H activation reaction of benzene with palladium acetate dialkylsulfide systems [19]. 

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