Metal Nitride Complexes with Non-innocent Carbene-phenolate Ligands for Hydrocarbon Amination

Organic feedstock chemicals such as those from extracted from natural gas and petroleum refinement are employed as fuels, however their abundance and relative inexpensive makes them attractive candidates as starting materials for other useful chemicals. This remains a difficult yet highly desired task for chemists, as these compounds are notoriously unreactive. We plan to develop catalysts; metal-containing compounds designed to facilitate feedstock transformation for use as viable reagents. Our approach is to synthesize these catalysts based on the active sites of certain metalloenzymes capable of facilitating these reactions elegantly at mild conditions. The key lies in the careful design of the surrounding framework bonded to the metal centre- the ligand. In most cases, the ligand does not participate in the electronic modifications in the overall catalyst, however our ligands (and those exemplified by the enzymes) are designed to shuttle electrons to and from the metal centre, greatly enhancing catalytic activity. Through a variety of approaches, this this project will result in the creation of new materials for the effective conversion of organic feedstocks.

Faculty Supervisor:

Tim Storr

Student:

Partner:

Université Grenoble Alpes;Mitacs - Vancouver

Discipline:

Physics

Sector:

Education

University:

Simon Fraser University

Program: