Isonitrile ruthenium and iron PNP complexes: Synthesis, characterization and catalytic assessment for base-free dehy- drogenative coupling of alcohols. Duc Hanh Nguyen,a Delphine Merel,a Nicolas Merle,a Xavier Trivelli,b Frédéric Capeta and Régis M. Gauvin*,c. a Univ. Lille, CNRS, Centrale Lille, ENSCL, Univ. Artois, UMR 8181 - UCCS - Unité de Catalyse et Chimie du Solide, F- 59000 Lille, France b Université de Lille, CNRS, INRA, Centrale Lille Institute, Univ. Artois, FR 2638 - IMEC - Institut Michel-Eugène Che- vreul, F-59000 Lille, France c Chimie ParisTech, PSL University, CNRS, Institut de Recherche de Chimie Paris, 75005 Paris, France. E-mail :
[email protected] KEYWORDS. Dehydrogenation • ruthenium • iron • pincer ligands • isonitrile. Supporting Information Placeholder H H ABSTRACT: Neutral and ionic ruthenium and iron aliphatic PNP -type pincer complexes (PNP = NH(CH2CH2PiPr2)2) bearing benzyl, n- H butyl or tert-butyl isocyanide ancillary ligands have been prepared and characterized. Reaction of [RuCl2(PNP )]2 with one equivalent CN- H R per ruthenium center affords complexes [Ru(PNP )Cl2(CNR)] (R= benzyl, 1a, R= n-butyl, 1b, R= t-butyl, 1c), with cationic H H [Ru(PNP )(Cl)(CNR)2]Cl 2a-c as side-products. Complexes 2a-c are selectively prepared upon reaction of [RuCl2(PNP )]2 with 2 equiva- H lents of isonitrile per ruthenium center. Dichloride species 1a-c react with excess NaBH4 to afford [Ru(PNP )(H)(BH4)(CN-R)] 3a-c, ana- logues to benchmark Takasago catalyst [Ru(PNP)(H)(BH4)(CO)]. Reaction of 1a-c with a single equivalent of NaBH4 under protic conditions results in formation of hydrido chloride derivatives [Ru(PNPH)(H)(Cl)(CN-R)] (4a-c), from which 3a-c can be prepared upon reaction with H excess NaBH4.