RSC Publishing


Publishing

 

Cover image for Dalton Transactions, select for current issue

Dalton Transactions

The international journal for inorganic, organometallic and bioinorganic chemistry



Subscribers

Non-subscribers

Free access



Paper

Dalton Trans., 2009, 7071 - 7079, DOI: 10.1039/b907124p

Facile C–S, S–H, and S–S bond cleavage using a nickel(0) NHC complex

Thomas Schaub, Marc Backes, Oliver Plietzsch and Udo Radius

[Ni2(iPr2Im)4(COD)] 1 (iPr2Im = 1,3-di(isopropyl)-imidazol-2-ylidene) reacts at room temperature with the thioethers methyl para-tolyl sulfide, ethyl phenyl sulfide, benzothiophene and dibenzothiophene to afford the C–S bond cleavage products [Ni(iPr2Im)2(4-CH3-C6H4)(SMe)] 2, [Ni(iPr2Im)2(C6H5)(SEt)] 3, [Ni(iPr2Im)2(1,8-benzothiophenylato)] 4 and [Ni(iPr2Im)2(C,S-dibenzothiophenylato)] 5. In contrast to the reaction of thioethers or sulfoxides (reported earlier), no C–S bond cleavage was observed for the reaction of 1 with the sulfones bezothiophene-1,1-dioxide and methyl phenyl sulfone. In those cases the stable compounds [Ni(iPr2Im)2(2-2,3-benzothiophene-1,1-dioxide)] 6 and [Ni(iPr2Im)2(2-MeSO2C6H5)] 7 with a 2-coordinated sulfone ligand have been isolated. Compound 6 has been structurally characterized. S–H bond cleavage was observed using 2-methyl-2-propanthiol to afford [Ni(iPr2Im)2(H)(StBu)] 8. The reaction of 1 with disulfides led to the dithiolato complexes [Ni(iPr2Im)2(SR)2] (R = tBu 9, Me 10, Ph 11) by S–S bond scission.

Graphical abstract image for this article (ID: b907124p)