For the first time, they have measured the reaction rates between a 16-electron organometallic complex and the large class of naturally occurring hydrocarbons known as alkanes.
Alkanes are compounds of carbon and hydrogen atoms held together by single bonds.
Chemists have long coveted the use of alkanes as feedstock for clean-burning fuels and a host of petrochemicals, including plastics, solvents, synthetic fibers, and pharmaceutical drugs. The problem has been that the bonds between an alkane's carbon and hydrogen atoms are so strong as to render alkanes generally unreactive. These compounds can break carbon-hydrogen bonds in alkanes and insert a metal atom. Bergman and fellow CSD and UCB chemist Brad Moore, working with postdoctoral fellow Bruce Weiller and UCB graduate student Eric Wasserman, have now been able to measure the reaction rates of this crucial step for a number of different alkanes. In their first round of experiments, the researchers utilized the liquefied noble gases krypton and xenon as solvents.