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The use of methane, the lightest hydrocarbon and primary component of natural gas, as a source for fine chemicals production remains an appealing goal on scientific, economic and environmental grounds (1-4). Transition metal catalyzed C-H bond activation is a promising approach to achieve functionalization of the strong and relatively inert C-H bonds of alkanes more generally. In one possible scenario, these reactions proceed by metal-promoted C-H bond oxidative cleavage followed by insertion of a suitable X group into the M-C bond and release of the functionalized product by means of reductive elimination of the C-X-H unit (5). Individual reaction steps for this and related catalytic cycles have been widely reported (6), but a major challenge has been that removal of the functionalized fragments from the metal coordination sphere is often unfavorable, due to the robustness of the M-C bonds. Only FINAL VERSION ACCEPTED

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A, a = 101.45(3)", V = 1505.7 A3, Z = 4, = 2 356 g/cm3. Of 2751 unique reflections measured (Cu,., 4.0 < 20 > 130.0). 2527 had I > 3 4 0 and were used in the solution and refinement with an empirical absorption correction ( p = 151.4 cm-I) applied Final refinement (230 variables) gave R = 0.0440. R, = 0.0488 and GOF = 4.03. Further details of the crystal structure investigationareavailable form the Director of the Cambridge Crystallographic Data Centre, University Chemical Laboratory, Lensfield Road, Cambridge CB2 1 EW (UK), on quoting the full journal citation. [lo] A. Bondi, J Phys. Chem. 68 (1964) 441. Ill] For an intramolecular CH.

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