Cyanide Ligand Assembly by Carbon Atom Transfer to an Iron Nitride Jorge L. Martinez,† Hsiu-Jung Lin,† Wei-Tsung Lee,†,‡ Maren Pink,† Chun-Hsing Chen,† Xinfeng Gao,† Diane A. Dickie,‖,ǀ and Jeremy M. Smith†,* † Department of Chemistry, Indiana University, 800 East Kirkwood Avenue, Bloomington, IN 47405, USA. ‖ Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM 87131, USA Supporting Information Placeholder ABSTRACT: The new iron(IV) nitride complex amino acids.11 For example, S-adenosylmethionine lyses free i - PhB( Pr2Im)3Fe≡N reacts with two equivalents of bis(diiso- tyrosine to produce the CN and CO ligands of [FeFe] hydro- 12 propylamino)cyclopropenylidene (BAC) to provide genase by a mechanism that involves radical intermediates. i PhB( Pr2Im)3Fe(CN)(N2)(BAC). This unusual example of a We have shown that iron(IV) nitride complexes supported four-electron reaction involves carbon atom transfer from by tris(carbene)borate ligands show a wide range of nitrogen i 13 ,14 ,15 BAC to create a cyanide ligand along with the alkyne Pr2N- atom transfer reactivity. These reactions include two- i C≡C-N Pr2. The iron complex is in equilibrium with an N2-free electron nitrogen atom transfer to a range of phosphines, species. Further reaction with CO leads to formation of a CO yielding a family of four-coordinate iron(II) spin crossover analogue, which can be independently prepared using NaCN complexes.16 Based on these results, we hypothesized that as the cyanide source, while reaction with B(C6F5)3 provides stronger σ-donor groups would provide additional stabiliza- the cyanoborane derivative. tion of the low spin state. This inspired us to investigate anal- ogous nitrogen atom transfer from these iron nitride com- plexes to stabilized carbenes, which are generally better σ-do- nors than phosphines.17 In this work, we report that the reac- The venerable cyanide ligand occupies a notable spot in the tion of an iron(IV) nitride with bis(diisopropylamino)cyclo- annals of chemistry, starting with the preparation of Prussian propenylidene does not provide the anticipated ketiminate blue in 1704.1,2 Its good σ-donor and π-acceptor properties, complex, but instead creates a cyanide ligand by carbon atom combined with its negative charge and ambidentate proper- transfer from the carbene to the nitride, to the best of our ties make cyanide a unique and versatile ligand. For example, knowledge a unique example of a four-electron carbon atom cyanide is able to stabilize a wide range of coordination num- transfer reaction. bers and oxidation states, with homoleptic complexes known The new iron(IV) nitride complex PhB(iPr Im) Fe≡N 1 is for coordination numbers 2 to 8 and oxidation numbers 0 to 2 3 prepared analogously to previously reported tris(carbene)bo- +5.3 Furthermore, cyanide is commonly used as a bridging rate iron(IV) nitrides.13 Specifically, irradiation of a mixture of group in the rational synthesis of well-defined metal clusters.4 PhB(iPr Im) FeCl and NaN leads to formation of 1 in good Cyanide also plays an important role in biology, most notably 2 3 3 yield. The red diamagnetic complex shows similar features to as a ligand in the active site clusters of [NiFe] and [FeFe] hy- previously reported iron(IV) nitrides,13,18 most notably a reso- drogenases, but also in other contexts, e.g. as defense agent in nance at δ = 1003 ppm in the 15N NMR spectrum that is char- many plant species.5 acteristic of the nitride ligand. Cyanide complexes are invariably prepared from alkali Complex 1 reacts with two equivalents of the isolable car- metal salts in relatively polar solvents.3,4 These cyanide salts bene bis(diisopropylamino)cyclopropenylidene (BAC)19 to are in turn manufactured from hydrogen cyanide, which is in- yield diamagnetic PhB(iPr Im) Fe(N )(CN)(BAC) 2, which has dustrially produced from ammonia and methane, either in the 2 3 2 been structurally characterized by single crystal X-ray diffrac- presence (Andrussow process) or absence (BMA process) of tion (Figure 1). Reaction with one equivalent of BAC results in air. Hydrogen cyanide is also a byproduct in the manufacture only 50 % conversion to the product, with half of the iron of acrylonitrile by the ammonoxidation of propylene (Sohio starting material unreacted. The molecular structure of 2 re- process).6 veals the complex to have a six-coordinate iron center that is While their synthesis from alkali metal salts remains ubiq- bound to the tripodal tris(carbene)borate, a BAC ligand and uitous, other methods for the synthesis of transition metal cy- N2. The most remarkable feature of the structure is the iden- 7 anide complexes are known. Most notably, cyanide com- tity of the remaining ligand, which has been formulated as cy- plexes can be prepared from organonitriles, e.g. by C-C oxida- anide on the basis of crystallographic and spectroscopic data, 8 tive addition. Cyanide ligands can also be accessed by reac- as well as reactivity studies and independent synthesis, as dis- 9 tion of carbonyl ligands with hexamethyldisilazide salts, or cussed in more detail below. hexamethyldisilazide complexes with CO.10 In biology, the carbon and nitrogen atoms of CN- are usually derived from Figure 1. Synthesis of complexes. Insets show the structures of complexes 2 and 4 as determined by single crystal X-ray diffraction. Thermal ellipsoids shown at 50% probability, hydrogen atoms omitted for clarity. Black, blue, pink and orange ellipsoids represent C, N, B and Fe atoms, respectively. Aside from the unexpected coordination sphere, the met- The solution behavior of 2 is complex, as revealed by varia- rical parameters of 2 are typical for a low spin iron(II) complex. ble temperature 1H NMR spectroscopy. At -50 °C, 10 reso- Thus, the bond lengths between iron and the cyanide (1.933(2) nances for the methine protons of the 10 inequivalent isopro- Å), tris(carbene)borate (1.975(2) – 2.011(2) Å) ligands are typi- pyl groups are observed in the 1H NMR spectrum, consistent cal for low spin iron iron(II),3,4,16 while the Fe-BAC bond length with the low symmetry structure observed for 2 in the solid (1.974(2) Å) is slightly shorter than observed in iron(0) BAC state. Increasing the temperature leads to broadening and co- 20 complexes. Similarly, the C≡N bond length (1.155(2) Å) and alescence of the resonances, suggesting reversible N2 binding Fe-C≡N bond angle (174.9(2) °) are within the expected range that is rapid on the NMR timescale. Consistent with this hy- for a low spin iron(II) cyanide complex. pothesis, a single broadened resonance (δ = 342.3 ppm) is ob- 15 It is notable that while the crystals of 2 are yellow, room served in the room temperature N NMR spectrum of a sam- 15 21 temperature solutions of the complex are blue. The blue color ple of 2 prepared under an atmosphere of N2. reversibly changes to yellow when 2 is cooled, which in turn The cyanide ligand has been additionally characterized by 15 15 becomes blue under vacuum, suggesting that the N2 ligand is spectroscopic methods. The N NMR spectrum of N-en- labile. This hypothesis is confirmed through the structural riched 2/3 (prepared from a sample of 1 containing 50 % 15N- characterization of blue crystals grown at room temperature, enriched nitride) shows a single resonance whose chemical with the crystallographic data also collected at room temper- shift (δ = 318 ppm) compares well with that observed for the 15 4- 22 ature so as to avoid N2 binding. The molecular structure re- cyanide ligand in [Fe(C N)6] (δ = 284 ppm). The solution veals that 3 is a five-coordinate iron complex formed by N2 loss IR spectrum of 2 shows two strong bands that are assigned to -1 - -1 from 2. While detailed structural insight is limited by the qual- the N2 (νNN = 2070 cm ) and CN (νCN = 2094 cm ) ligands, ity of the data, the short distance between iron and one of the respectively. Consistent with loss of the N2 ligand, only the lat- tris(carbene)borate isopropyl methyl groups (2.81(1) Å) sug- ter band is observed in the solid state IR spectrum of blue 3. gests that loss of the N2 ligand is accompanied by the for- The frequency of this band is typical for that of a terminal cy- mation of an interaction between iron and the isopropyl anide ligand.4 group. Scheme 1. -1 The other product of the reaction between 1 and BAC is the cm ), which in turn reacts with excess NaCN to provide 4 in i i alkyne Pr2N-C≡C-N Pr2, which has been characterized by mul- high yield. The spectroscopic signatures of the complex pre- tinuclear NMR spectroscopy and CI-MS. A notable spectro- pared by this route are identical to those observed for the scopic feature of this compound is the dramatically downfield complex whose synthesis originates from 1. shift (δ = 206 ppm) of the alkyne carbon resonance in the As expected, the newly formed cyanide ligand shows Lewis 13 1 C{ H} NMR spectrum, likely a consequence of the presence basic properties. Thus, 2/3 react with B(C6F5)3 to yield the di- i of the electron-withdrawing nitrogen atoms. amagnetic adduct PhB( Pr2Im)3Fe(N2)(CNB(C6F5)3)(BAC) 6. The combined structural and spectroscopic data therefore As has been observed for other adducts between cyanide lig- reveals that the reaction between 1 and BAC results in carbon ands and B(C6F5)3, the cyanide stretch moves to a higher fre- -1 23 atom transfer to the nitride, leading to the assembly of a new quency in the IR spectrum (νCN = 2133 cm ), while the cya- cyanide ligand.