Concepts of metal-mediated methane functionalization. An intersection
of experiment and theory*
Helmut Schwarz** and Detlef Schröder
Institut für Organische Chemie der Technischen
Universität Berlin, Straße des 17. Juni 135, D-10623 Berlin,
Germany
Abstract: Concepts for the activation of methane are derived
from ion-molecule reactions of mass-selected, ground-state transition-metal
cations M+. Elementary steps of industrially important processes
are uncovered (e.g., oxygenation of methane or its coupling with carbon
dioxide). In addition, the implications of the electronic structures
of M(CH2)+ complexes for their reactions with
nucleophiles are discussed, and the crucial role of contemporary quantum
mechanical calculations in the elucidation of mechanistic details is
emphasized.
*Plenary lecture presented at the 15th
International Conference on Physical Organic Chemistry (ICPOC 15), Göteborg,
Sweden, 8 13 July 2000. Other presentations are published in this
issue, pp. 2219 2358.
**Corresponding author
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