Organo-metallic complexes for fine organic synthesis
Catalysts play a vital role in industry due to their unique ability to accelerate or ignite complex chemical reactions. These remarkable materials should be investigated fully so that the known group of catalysts continually expands. Complexes between platinum group metals and carbenes or carboranes yield a range of promising catalysts or catalyst precursors. A number of such complexes based on ruthenium, rhodium and iridium are being tested for their ability to induce selective synthesis of enantiomers. Of particular interest is the cyclopropanation of activated olefins and olefin metathesis. Ruthenium complexes have proved effective for cyclopropanation. Rhodium based catalysts work too, but need higher temperatures with no gain in selectivity. The metathesis reactions induced by ruthenium-carborene complexes are also being studied.