115 / 2023-10-09 21:02:59

Exploring the Scope and Coordination Behaviour of New Diphosphane Ligands

bicyclic diphosphane, metal coordination, catalysts.

New Technologies in Phosphorus Chemistry > 4) Inorganic phosphorus chemistry

A new series of bicyclic diphosphane compounds, C₄H₈P₂(NR)₂, were synthesised through a simple one-step approach (Fig 1) which takes place at room temperature.¹ These reactions proceed via an intermediate phosphonium salt. All new diphosphanes were fully characterised and, in some cases, their molecular structures were verified by single crystal X-ray crystallography. The coordination capabilities of these diphosphanes were studied with a range of late transition metal precursors based on Pt(II), Pd(II), Ir(III), Ru(II), and Rh(III).^1,2 All complexes were fully characterised, and some molecular structures were determined by single crystal X-ray crystallography. A small library of binuclear Ru(II) complexes were used as catalysts for the ethanol to n-butanol Guerbet reaction.³ This work indicates that diphosphanes show good potential in the catalyst arena.