The alkylation of imidazole and 5 benzyloxycarbonyl 3,4 diethylpyrrole with 1,3 bis (hydroxymethyl)ferrocene (1) afforded bis imidazole (4) and bis pyrrole (7) derivatives of ferrocene, respectively. The reaction of diol 1 with trifluoroacetic acid gave the dicarbocationic complex [{1,3 (CH 2 ) 2 C 5 H 3 }Fe(C 5 H 5 )] 2+ (2) characterized by 1 H NMR spectroscopy.Previously, 1 we have reported on the phosphorylation of 1,3 bis(hydroxymethyl)ferrocene (1) giving ferrocene diphosphines {1,3 (R 2 PCH 2 ) 2 C 5 H 3 }Fe(C 5 H 5 ) (R = Pr i , Bu t ). The latter were used as the starting compounds for the synthesis of P,C,P pincer complexes with the ferrocene backbone. Rhodium, 1 palladium, 2,3 iridium, 4 and ruthe nium 5 bis(phosphine) pincer complexes with the ferrocene or ruthenocene backbone are presently known. These com plexes have attracted interest due to their ability to acti vate small molecules and hydrocarbon substrates and cat alyze a variety of reactions, among which of great impor tance is the homogeneous dehydrogenation. Recently, 4 it has been shown that the iridium complex IrH 2 [{2,5 (Bu t 2 CH 2 ) 2 C 5 H 2 }Fe(C 5 H 5 )] is the most active catalyst for alkane dehydrogenation among all known homogeneous systems.The chemistry of metallocene based pincer complexes is in its infancy. In the future, it is necessary to use in a greater extent the potential of these systems conditioned by the sandwich geometry of metallocenes and the ability to vary the metallocene central atom and its oxidation state in the case of the iron atom in ferrocene. It would expect that pincer complexes having the metallocene back bone would be used for the creation of new generation polymetallic catalysts and materials having useful photo physical and sensor properties. The progress in this area is related to the development of convenient methods for the synthesis of functionalized 1,3 disubstituted metal locenes, 3-9 which are nowadays much more difficult to synthesize compared to 1,1´ and 1,2 disubstituted ana logs. It is also necessary to design pincer ligands contain ing donor atoms other than phosphorus, for example, car bon atoms of N heterocyclic carbenes and nitrogen atoms of N heterocycles.In the present study, we describe the first results on the synthesis of precursors of new types of pincer ligands based on ferrocene. The alkylation of imidazole and substituted pyrrole with diol 1 afforded the diimidazole and dipyrrole derivatives of ferrocene, respectively.
Results and DiscussionThe ferrocenylmethylation can be performed with the use of ferrocenylmethyl halides (rather unstable com pounds), ferrocenylcarbinols, or ferrocenylmethylammo nium salts. 10 These reactions proceed through the forma tion of α ferrocenyl carbocations, whose enhanced stabil ity is well known. 11 The ferrocene carbocations were char acterized by 1 H, 13 C, and 57 Fe NMR spectroscopy. The most stable of them, as well as their ruthenium and osmi um analogs, were isolated as crystalline salts and were studied by X ray diffraction. 11,12 Unlike fe...