Professor Vicky Montiel-Palma of Mississippi State University

"E-substituted polydentate phosphines as versatile ligands for transition metal catalysts"

The design and synthesis of pincer ligands incorporating a variety of donor atom combinations for transition metal coordination has led to a wealth of new complexes with remarkable reactivity and/or catalytic activity. In this talk, our group’s results on the synthesis and reactivity of late transition metal complexes bearing semirigid E-phosphine (E = Si, Ge or Sn) ligands will be presented. Chemisorption of organometallic complexes on inorganic supports is a powerful strategy for developing heterogeneous, single-site, homogeneous-in-function catalysts. Typical support materials are crucial in stabilizing reaction intermediates and site-isolating reactive species throughout the catalytic cycle. As a case study, herein we show dehydrogenative silylation/hydrosilylation of alkenes and hydroborylation of aldehydes and ketones as model reactions which allow direct comparisons of the catalytic activity in homogeneous phase vis-à-vis those of the materials grafted onto Metal Organic Frameworks as solid supports. Further work will focus on the exploration of the generality of this concept for catalyst control and ability to access unique catalysts through grafting onto MOF materials.