Ruthenium-catalyzed C-C bond cleavage in lignin model substrates

Thorsten vom Stein; Tim den Hartog; Julien Buendia; Spas Stoychev; Jakob Mottweiler; Carsten Bolm; Jürgen Klankermayer; Walter Leitner

doi:10.1002/anie.201410620

Ruthenium-catalyzed C-C bond cleavage in lignin model substrates

Angew Chem Int Ed Engl. 2015 May 11;54(20):5859-63. doi: 10.1002/anie.201410620. Epub 2015 Mar 25.

Authors

Thorsten vom Stein¹, Tim den Hartog, Julien Buendia, Spas Stoychev, Jakob Mottweiler, Carsten Bolm, Jürgen Klankermayer, Walter Leitner

Affiliation

¹ Institut für Technische und Makromolekulare Chemie, RWTH Aachen University, Worringerweg 1, 52074 Aachen (Germany) www.itmc.rwth-aachen.de.

PMID: 25809138
DOI: 10.1002/anie.201410620

Abstract

Ruthenium-triphos complexes exhibited unprecedented catalytic activity and selectivity in the redox-neutral C-C bond cleavage of the β-O-4 lignin linkage of 1,3-dilignol model compounds. A mechanistic pathway involving a dehydrogenation-initiated retro-aldol reaction for the C-C bond cleavage was proposed in line with experimental data and DFT calculations.

Keywords: CC bond cleavage; cleavage reactions; homogeneous catalysis; lignin; ruthenium complexes.