Conspectus
Redox reactions that take place in enzymes and
on the surfaces
of heterogeneous catalysts often require active sites that contain
multiple metals. By contrast, there are very few homogeneous catalysts
with multinuclear active sites, and the field of organometallic chemistry
continues to be dominated by the study of single metal systems. Multinuclear
catalysts have the potential to display unique properties owing to
their ability to cooperatively engage substrates. Furthermore, direct
metal-to-metal covalent bonding can give rise to new electronic configurations
that dramatically impact substrate binding and reactivity. In order
to effectively capitalize on these features, it is necessary to consider
strategies to avoid the dissociation of fragile metal–metal
bonds in the course of a catalytic cycle. This Account describes one
approach to accomplishing this goal using binucleating redox-active
ligands.
In 2006, Chirik showed that pyridine–diimines
(PDI) have
sufficiently low-lying π* levels that they can be redox-noninnocent
in low-valent iron complexes. Extending this concept, we investigated
a series of dinickel complexes supported by naphthyridine–diimine
(NDI) ligands. These complexes can promote a broad range of two-electron
redox processes in which the NDI ligand manages electron equivalents
while the metals remain in a Ni(I)–Ni(I) state.
Using
(NDI)Ni2 catalysts, we have uncovered cases where
having two metals in the active site addresses a problem in catalysis
that had not been adequately solved using single-metal systems. For
example, mononickel complexes are capable of stoichiometrically dimerizing
aryl azides to form azoarenes but do not turn over due to strong product
inhibition. By contrast, dinickel complexes are effective catalysts
for this reaction and avoid this thermodynamic sink by binding to
azoarenes in their higher-energy cis form.
Dinickel complexes
can also activate strong bonds through the cooperative
action of both metals. Norbornadiene has a ring-strain energy that
is similar to that of cyclopropane but is not prone to undergoing
C–C oxidative addition with monometallic complexes. Using an
(NDI)Ni2 complex, norbornadiene undergoes rapid ring opening
by the oxidative addition of the vinyl and bridgehead carbons. An
inspection of the resulting metallacycle reveals that it is stabilized
through a network of secondary Ni−π interactions. This
reactivity enabled the development of a catalytic carbonylative rearrangement
to form fused bicyclic dienones.
These vignettes and others
described in this Account highlight
some of the implications of metal–metal bonding in promoting
a challenging step in a catalytic cycle or adjusting the thermodynamic
landscape of key intermediates. Given that our studies have focused
nearly exclusively on the (NDI)Ni2 system, we anticipate
that many more such cases are left to be discovered as other transition-metal
combinations and ligand classes are explored.