Transition metals redox-catalyzed substitution

Figure 3.6 Redox-catalyzed substitution in transition metal chemistry.

Goals and five limitations in conjunction with the development of selective catalytic homogeneous oxidation systems are evaluated. Systems are presented that address several of the problems or goals. One involves oxidation of alkenes by hypochlorite catalyzed by oxidatively resistant d-electron-transition-metal-substituted (TMSP) complexes. A second involves oxidation of alkenes by H2O2 catalyzed by specific TMSP complexes, and a third addresses functionalization of redox active polyoxometalate complexes with organic groups. 

It has been already emphasized that substitution of heteroelements into the framework of molecular sieves creates acidic sites. Incorporation of transition elements such as Ti, V, Mn, Fe, or Co, which have redox properties, provides molecular sieves with redox active sites that are involved in oxidation reactions (323-332). As mentioned in the beginning of the article, the transition metal-substituted molecular sieves, the so-called redox molecular sieves, exhibit several advantages compared with other types of heterogeneous redox catalysts (1) redox sites are isolated in a well-defined internal structure therefore, oligomerization of the active oxometal species is prevented (this is a major reason for the deactivation of homogeneous catalysts) (2) the site isolation (the so-called microenvironment) of redox centers prevents the leaching of the metal ions, which frequently happens in liquid-phase oxidations catalyzed by conventional transition metal-supported catalysts (3) well-defined cavities and channels of molecular dimensions endow the catalysts with unique performances such as the shape selectivity (and traffic control) toward reactants, intermediates, and/or products. 

A parallel development was initiated by the first publications from Sawamoto and Matyjaszweski. They reported independently on the transition-metal-catalyzed polymerization of various vinyl monomers (14,15). The technique, which was termed atom transfer radical polymerization (ATRP), uses an activated alkyl halide as initiator, and a transition-metal complex in its lower oxidation state as the catalyst. Similar to the nitroxide-mediated polymerization, ATRP is based on the reversible termination of growing radicals. ATRP was developed as an extension of atom transfer radical addition (ATRA), the so-called Kharasch reaction (16). ATRP turned out to be a versatile technique for the controlled polymerization of styrene derivatives, acrylates, methacrylates, etc. Because of the use of activated alkyl halides as initiators, the introduction of functional endgroups in the polymer chain turned out to be easy (17-22). Although many different transition metals have been used in ATRP, by far the most frequently used metal is copper. Nitrogen-based ligands, eg substituted bipyridines (14), alkyl pyridinimine (Schiff s base) (23), and multidentate tertiary alkyl amines (24), are used to solubilize the metal salt and to adjust its redox potential in order to match the requirements for an ATRP catalyst. In conjunction with copper, the most powerful ligand at present is probably tris[2-(dimethylamino)ethyl)]amine (Mee-TREN) (25). 

On the basis of these analyses, we hypothesized the use of an earth-abundant transition-metal complex containing a non-redox-active metal center and redox-active (non-innocent) ligand as a catalyst. We demonstrated our prediction on [(PDl)Ca(THF)3], where PDI is a non-innocent pyridine-2,6-diimine ligand, and the catalyzed benzyhc (of the MeCH2Ph substrate) C-H bond alkylation by unsubstituted and diphenyl (termed the iio or-(io or)-substituted diazocarbene precursors, N2CH2 and N2CPh2. 

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