Crown ether adducts of light alkali metal triphenylsilyls: synthesis, structure and hydrosilylation catalysis

Valeri Leich; Kevin Lamberts; Thomas P Spaniol; Jun Okuda

doi:10.1039/c4dt00916a

Crown ether adducts of light alkali metal triphenylsilyls: synthesis, structure and hydrosilylation catalysis

Dalton Trans. 2014 Oct 14;43(38):14315-21. doi: 10.1039/c4dt00916a.

Authors

Valeri Leich¹, Kevin Lamberts, Thomas P Spaniol, Jun Okuda

Affiliation

¹ Institute of Inorganic Chemistry, RWTH Aachen University, Landoltweg 1, D-52056 Aachen, Germany. jun.okuda@ac.rwth-aachen.de.

PMID: 24870359
DOI: 10.1039/c4dt00916a

Abstract

Alkali metal triphenylsilyls [Li(12-crown-4)SiPh3]·(thf)0.5 (2), [Na(15-crown-5)SiPh3]·(thf)0.5 (3) and [K(18-crown-6)SiPh3(thf)] (4) were synthesized using 1,1,1-trimethyl-2,2,2-triphenyldisilane (Ph3SiSiMe3) and isolated in high yields. Solid state structures were determined by single crystal X-ray diffraction. These alkali metal silyls catalyzed the regioselective hydrosilylation of 1,1-diphenylethylene to give the anti-Markovnikov product. The presence of crown ethers enhanced the reactivity of the metal silyls in hydrosilylation catalysis.