Hydrocarbyl complexes bonding

N-heterocyclic carbenes (NHC) are considered extremely effective hgands for homogeneous catalysis (Figure 6.2). These specific carbenes often lead to high efficiencies in metal-catalyzed reactions compared to traditional phosphines [49, 50). NHC complexes are usually considered to be very stable, due to their electronic properties and the unusually high bond dissociation energies (BDE) associated with NHCs [51]. Previous work has shown that Ni-hydrocarbyl complexes of NHCs readily decompose by reductive elimination to yield the 2-substituted imidazohum salts [52, 53). Later studies have shown that the reverse reaction, oxidative addition of imidazohum salts to zerovalent Group 10 metals, is feasible [53]. 

The triruthenium pentahydrido complex Cp Ru(jU-H) 3(/i3-H)2 7 shows remarkable reactivity toward hydrocarbons, such as diene, alkyne, alkene, and even alkane, and various hydrocarbyl complexes have been synthesized in good yields. From the reaction of 7 with 1,1-disubstituted alkene, a /i3-methylidyne-/tt3- ( )-alkyne complex 45 was obtained as a result of the C=C bond cleavage of a /i3-77 -vinylidene intermediate 44 (Equation (15)). The /r3-methylidyne-jU3- 7 ( )-alkyne complexes were alternatively synthesized by the thermolysis of /tt3-diruthena-allyl complexes 3Sa and 3Sb, which were obtained by the reaction of 7 with butadiene and isoprene, respectively (Equation (16)). 

Interest in iridium hydrocarbyl complexes has been fueled by the higher thermodynamic stability of both Ir-C and Ir-H bonds in comparison to related compounds of rhodium. Therefore, iridium alkyl and aryl complexes have been frequently and successfully used as kinetically inert models for a variety of rhodium-catalyzed reactions allowing to collect intriguing mechanistic information on important industrial processes and organometallic reactions of academic interest. 

Oxidative additions involving C-H bond breaking have recently been the topic of an extensive study, usually referred to as C-H activation the idea is that the M-H and M-hydrocarbyl bonds formed will be much more prone to functionalization than the unreactive C-H bond. Intramolecular oxidative additions of C-H bonds have been known for quite some time see Figure 2.15. This process is named orthometallation or cyclometallation. It occurs frequently in metal complexes, and is not restricted to "ortho" protons. It is referred to as cyclometallation and is often followed by elimination of HX, while the metal returns to its initial (lower) oxidation state. 

Insertion of carbon monoxide and alkenes into metal-carbon bonds is one of the most important reaction steps in homogeneous catalysis. It has been found for insertion processes of platinum [16] that the relative positions of the hydrocarbyl group and the unsaturated fragment must be cis in the reacting complex [17], The second issue concerns the stereochemical course of the reaction, insertion versus migration as discussed in Chapter 2.2. 

Recently, we [53] and others [54] simultaneously reported an example of a complex in which the transition metal dictates the coordination mode, viz. urea-functionalized phosphine 20, which forms a trans palladium complex, complemented by hydrogen bonding ofthe urea fragments (Figure 10.6). Bear in mind that any monophosphine, and even wide bite angle diphosphines, give trans complexes with a hydrocarbyl palladium halide. More interestingly, the urea moieties can function as a host for another halide ion. 

Metallacyclobutene complexes of both early and late transition metals can, in some cases, be prepared by intramolecular 7-hydrogen elimination, although the intimate mechanism of the reaction varies across the transition series. For low-valent late metals, the reaction is generally assumed to proceed via the oxidative addition of an accessible 7-C-H bond (Scheme 28, path A), but for early metals and, presumably, any metal in a relatively high oxidation state, a concerted cr-bond metathesis is considered most probable (path B). In this process, the 7-C-H bond interacts directly with an M-X fragment (typically a second hydrocarbyl residue) to produce the metallacycle with the extrusion of H-X (i.e., a hydrocarbon). Either sp3- or spz-hybridized C-H bonds can participate in the 7-hydrogen elimination. 

Lanthanide Complexes with cr-Bonded Hydrocarbyl Ligands 1... 

LANTHANIDE COMPLEXES WITH n-BONDED HYDROCARBYL LIGANDS... 

Complexes with Three and More [Pg.4240]

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