Olefins, hydrogenation catalytic isomerization reactions

As it can be appreciated in Table 2.33, there are different kinds of hydrogenation and isomerization reactions. Fundamental differences between these processes arise from the way the catalyst precursor is converted in either coor-dinately or electron unsaturated species able to interact with the olefin beginning thus a catalytic cycle. 

Reactions over chromium oxide catalysts are often carried out without the addition of hydrogen to the reaction mixture, since this addition tends to reduce the catalytic activity. Thus, since chromium oxide is highly active for dehydrogenation, under the usual reaction conditions (temperature >500°C) extensive olefin formation occurs. In the following discussion we shall, in the main, be concerned only with skeletally distinguished products. Information about reaction pathways has been obtained by a study of the reaction product distribution from unlabeled (e.g. 89, 3, 118, 184-186, 38, 187) as well as from 14C-labeled reactants (89, 87, 88, 91-95, 98, 188, 189). The main mechanistic conclusions may be summarized. Although some skeletal isomerization occurs, chromium oxide catalysts are, on the whole, less efficient for skeletal isomerization than are platinum catalysts. Cyclic C5 products are of never more than very minor impor-... 

Kinetics. Since the hydrogenation of 1-hexene is accompanied by isomerization to the internal olefin, the catalytic cycle involves an alkyl intermediate which must be formed by inserting the coordinated 1-alkene. Reaction 7 proposes a mechanism for the hydrogenation ... 

If a catalytic cycle composed of several elementary processes is promoted on an isolated single site, we could make distinctions about the function of the active sites. For example, some metal complexes which are active for the isomerization reaction of olefins via alkyl intermediates are not effective catalysts for the hydrogenation reaction, and such differences in catalytic ability of the metal complexes is explained by the numbers of coordinatively unsaturated sites which are available for the reactions as described schematically in Scheme 7. 

Olefinic double-bond isomerization is probably one of the most commonly observed and well-studied reactions that uses transition metals as catalysts [1]. However, prior to our first achievement of asymmetric isomerization of allylamine by optically active Co(I) complex catalysts [2], there were only a few examples of catalytic asymmetric isomerization, and these were characterized by very low asymmetric induction (<4% ee) [3], In 1978 we reported that an enantioselective hydrogen migration of a prochiral allylamine such as AVV-diethylgerany-lamine, (1) or N V-diethylnerylamine (2) gave optically active citronellal ( )-enamine 3 with about 32% ee utilizing Co(I)-DIOP [DIOP = 2,3-0-isopropylidene-2,3-dihydroxy-l,4-bis(diphenylphosphino)butane] complexes as the catalyst (eq 3.1). 

Arene oxides show the characteristic reactions of epoxides (isomerization to ketones, reductions to alcohols, nucleophilic additions, deoxygenations) and olefins or conjugated dienes (catalytic hydrogenation, photochemical isomerization, cycloaddition, epoxidation, metal complexation). Where a spontaneous, rapid equilibration between the arene oxide and oxepin forms exists, reactivity typical of a conjugated triene is also found. 

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