EuroTech Chemistry and Chemical Engineering Series #7

The newly established EuroTech Working Group on Chemistry and Chemical Engineering is launching a biweekly online seminar series: Every other Wednesday, the group is offering a one-hour talk open to all. Join us on 7 July for the seventh talk:

Prof. Graham de Ruiter 
Schulich Faculty of Chemistry, Technion – Israel Institute of Technology

Noble Metal Like Catalysis with Iron:
One Carbon Atom Makes All the Difference

Abstract
The continuous effort to present a more sustainable outlook for future generations has led to a renaissance in the use of earth-abundant metals in homogenous catalysis. Their natural abundance, low-toxicity, and ready availability have been strong incentives to replace their less environmentally friendly noble metal counterparts. In addition, the smaller ionic radii, and typically high-spin electronic structure have resulted in unique reactivity that can be otherwise hard to realize with their heavier congeners. Nonetheless, there are only a few examples of earth-abundant metal catalyst that can achieve noble-metal like reactivity. In this lecture, we will review earth-abundant metal ligand design and demonstrate how the addition of one carbon atom can make all the difference between a mediocre and an excellent catalyst. We will use our recently developed PC_NHCP iron complexes as example where we will also explore the effect of oxidation and spin-state on the reactivity of these complexes in a variety of transformations including in alkene isomerization, C−H bond activation, and in hydrogen isotope exchange.