Bifunctionality in Organometallic Catalysis
Jitendra K. Bera
Department of Chemistry, Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur, Kanpur 208016.
E-mail: jbera@iitk.ac.in
Web: http://home.iitk.ac.in/~jbera/

The ‘synergism’ between different components (metal and ligand) is being increasingly
exploited in organometallic catalysis. Bimetallic catalysis is based on the premise thatenhanced reaction rate and higher selectivity might emerge from the cooperative
participation of two metal ions. Even new catalytic transformations have been
contemplated originating from cooperative action between metal ions. Towards thisobjective, a variety of dinuclear complexes, with or without metal-metal bonds, aresynthesized and their catalytic properties are evaluated.1-5 In a different approch,bifunctional catalysts are developed to employ water as a reagent.6 Hydration of nitriles
and olefin-oxidation reactions are carried out in which the metal and the ligand cooperate
in a synergistic manner and their interplay facilitates the chemical process. The same
principle is used for the synthesis of organic amide from alcohoal and amine. For thispurpose, naphthyridine functionalized N-heterocyclic carbene (NHC) ligands aredeveloped and their complexation reactions with a variety of metal ions are studied.7-10
This talk would also focus on the bifunctional activation of C-H bond and its relevance inorganometallic catalysis.11-13

References(1) Chem. Commun. 2013, 49, 9764. (2) Organometallics 2013, 32, 9764. (3) Eur. J. Inorg. Chem.
2012, 1680. (4) Organometallics 2011, 30, 2051. (5) Chem. –Eur. J. 2010, 16, 2574. (6) Chem. –Eur. J. 2010, 16, 14459. (7) Organometallics 2012, 31, 3790. (8) Organometallics 2012, 31, 5533.
(9) J. Organomet. Chem. 2011, 696, 1248. (10) Inorg. Chem. 2009, 48, 11114. (11)Organometallics 2013, 32, 192. (12) Organometallics 2013, 32, 340. (13) Organometallics 2006,
25, 6054.

A short CV of the speaker

Jitendra K. Bera
Professor
Department of Chemistry and Center for Environmental Science andEngineering, IIT Kanpur, Kanpur 208016, India.
E-mail: jbera@iitk.ac.in
Webpage: http://home.iitk.ac.in/~jbera/Your color
photograph here
Bera received his M. Sc. from the University of Kalyani in 1993 and his Ph. D. from the Indian
Institute of Science in 1999. After a couple of postdoctoral stints at Purdue University and at
Texas A&M University, he joined the faculty at IIT Kanpur in 2003 where he is presently aProfessor. He is the recipient of the Ramanna fellowship and the Swarnajayanti fellowship fromDST, India, and has received the CRSI bronze medal for the year 2011. Bera's research interests
span synthetic, structural and mechanistic organometallic chemistry. Recent efforts are directed
toward bifunctional activation of small and abundant molecules and their catalytictransformations to useful chemicals. Bera is recently elected as fellow to Indian academy ofscience (FASc).

Selected important references:
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Chem. Commun. 2013, 49, 9764.
Organometallics 2013, 32, 340.
Inorg. Chem. 2013, 52, 1432.
Organometallics 2013, 32, 192.
Organometallics 2013, 32, 4306.
Organometallics 2012, 31, 5533.
Organometallics 2012, 31, 3790.
Inorg. Chem. 2012, 51, 1319.
Organometallics 2011, 30, 2051.
10. Chem. Commun. 2011, 47, 10836.