Accessing Low-Valent Inorganic Cations by Using an Extremely Bulky N-Heterocyclic Carbene

Matthew M D Roy; Paul A Lummis; Michael J Ferguson; Robert McDonald; Eric Rivard

doi:10.1002/chem.201703215

Accessing Low-Valent Inorganic Cations by Using an Extremely Bulky N-Heterocyclic Carbene

Chemistry. 2017 Aug 22;23(47):11249-11252. doi: 10.1002/chem.201703215. Epub 2017 Jul 27.

Authors

Matthew M D Roy¹, Paul A Lummis¹, Michael J Ferguson¹, Robert McDonald¹, Eric Rivard¹

Affiliation

¹ Department of Chemistry, University of Alberta, 11227 Saskatchewan Drive, Edmonton, AB, T6G 2G2, Canada.

PMID: 28703433
DOI: 10.1002/chem.201703215

Abstract

The extremely bulky N-heterocyclic carbene (NHC), ITr (ITr=[(HCNCPh₃ )₂ C:]) featuring sterically shielding umbrella-shaped trityl (CPh₃ ) substituents was prepared. This NHC features the highest percent buried volume (%V_bur ) to date, and was used to form a thermally stable quasi one-coordinate thallium(I) cation [ITr-Tl]⁺ . This Tl^I adduct and the corresponding lithium complex [ITr⋅Li(OEt₂ )]⁺ are versatile "all-in-one" transmetalation/ligation reagents for preparing low-coordinate inorganic species inaccessible by pre-existing routes.

Keywords: cations; germanium; ligand design; main group chemistry; thallium.