Van der Waals forces have long been shown to affect the structures of large macromolecules. However, recently there is a growing interest in the effects of these forces on organic and organometallic structures. Their interest in organometallic chemistry arises from the use of a non-covalent interactions to stabilize structures. However, other non-covalent interactions (Hydrogen bonding, π-π interactions) use systems that are susceptible to highly reactive metals. Van der Waals forces can avoid this flaw due to their presence between unreactive molecular groups such as alkanes and cycloalkanes.<br/>Our group has utilized this strategy in the pursuit of low-coordinate transition metal complexes. However, in using ligands that have been shown to generate significant attractive dispersion forces, we have stumbled upon a copper system in which the metal disproportionates in the presence of the ligand to form a higher oxidation state organometallic compound.<br/>In pursuit of even higher oxidation state compounds in which the van der Waals forces are not enough to induce disproportionation, they may still allow for their stabilization. However, a difficulty arises from the strength of the oxidant required to oxidize these compounds as cyclic voltammetry shows no viable oxidation pathway. To avoid this difficulty we utilize the reaction of an oxidizing haloamine with a cuprate to produce the high oxidation state copper product in a salt elimination reaction.

Using dispersion forces to isolate low-valent high-oxidation state copper complexes

253rd National Meeting (2017)

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