Uranium and transuranium elements alkoxides

The alkoxides of actinides are rarely studied except the derivatives of uranium and thorium, as interest in the alkoxides of these 2 elements has increased by the hope to use them in the isotope-separation processes. The study of uranium alkoxides was initiated by groups led by Gilman and Bradley in the 1950s. The major part of this work is still carried out at the Nuclear Research Center at Los Alamos in the United States by the group of Sattelberger et al. [1671]. The detailed data on alkoxides ofuranium is provided in a number of 

Chemical composition. Structure Synth. Properties route Investig, 1 Ref. methods ]  

Nearly all the methods described in Chapter 2 have been applied for the preparation of uranium derivatives. The reaction of metallic uranium with alcohols in the presence of halogenes (method 1) doesn t lead, as it turned out, to homoleptic alkoxides, but is a facile route to alkoxide halides [79, 1669]  

The interaction of U and Pu with a mixture of alcohol and CC14 was used in particular for the dissolution of the nuclear wastes, but the products of it were not isolated [1701], 

Practically all the uranium alkoxides, excluding the polymeric derivatives of uranium (IV) and those of dioxouranium (VI), are rather highly soluble in both polar and nonpolar organic solvents (Table 12.20). Lowvalent ( IT-HI) derivatives are not volatile because of redox transformations that apparently accompany the heating. The volatility of alkoxoderivatives increases from tetrav-alent to hexavalent ones and in each homologous series with the increase in the size and ramification of the radical. 

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