Innocent Co-ligands

Throughout the text, when the co-ligands are of only secondary interest, or when the generality of a reaction is to be emphasized, the abbreviation LM will be used to indicate a general metal M with a set of V ligands. Ligands which adopt a purely spectator role are often referred to as innocent . 

Alfred Werner was awarded the Nobel Prize for chemistry in 1913. 

Aliphatic (i.e. sp3 N) amines have a rich coordination chemistry dating back to the seminal studies of Alfred Werner, which raised the curtain on coordination chemistry. 

They are strong a-donors, but have no energetically accessible molecular orbitals available of the correct ji-symmetry for retrodative combi- 

Finally, just as polydentate amines find wide application in biological and synthetic coordination chemistry, so too do bi- and to a lesser extent tridentate phosphines. In addition to simple kinetic stabilization through 

---