A major driving force for development of new catalyst systems is the need for more efficient synthesis of chemical compounds essential to modern life. Catalysts having superior performance offer significant environmental and economic advantages, but their discovery is not trivial. Well-defined, homogeneous catalysts can offer unparalleled understanding of ligand effects, which proves invaluable in directing redesign strategies. This thesis work focuses on the design of ruthenium complexes for applications in dinitrogen activation and olefin metathesis. The complexes developed create new directions in small-molecule activation and asymmetric catalysis by late-metal complexes. Also examined are the dual challenges, ubiquitous in catalysis, of adequate interrogation of catalyst structure and performance. Insight into both is essential to enable correlation of ligand properties with catalyst activity and/or selectivity. Improved methods for accelerated assessment of catalyst performance are described, which expand high-throughput catalyst screening to encompass parallel acquisition of kinetic data. A final aspect focuses on direct examination of metal complexes, both as isolated species, and under catalytic conditions. Applications of charge-transfer MALDI mass spectrometry to structural elucidation in organometallic chemistry is described, and the technique is employed to gain insight into catalyst decomposition pathways under operating conditions.

A major driving force for development of new catalyst systems is the need for more efficient synthesis of chemical compounds essential to modern life. Catalysts having superior performance offer significant environmental and economic advantages, but their discovery is not trivial. Well-defined, homogeneous catalysts can offer unparalleled understanding of ligand effects, which proves invaluable in directing redesign strategies. This thesis work focuses on the design of ruthenium complexes for applications in dinitrogen activation and olefin metathesis. The complexes developed create new directions in small-molecule activation and asymmetric catalysis by late-metal complexes. Also examined are the dual challenges, ubiquitous in catalysis, of adequate interrogation of catalyst structure and performance. Insight into both is essential to enable correlation of ligand properties with catalyst activity and/or selectivity. Improved methods for accelerated assessment of catalyst performance are described, which expand high-throughput catalyst screening to encompass parallel acquisition of kinetic data. A final aspect focuses on direct examination of metal complexes, both as isolated species, and under catalytic conditions. Applications of charge-transfer MALDI mass spectrometry to structural elucidation in organometallic chemistry is described, and the technique is employed to gain insight into catalyst decomposition pathways under operating conditions.

A major driving force for development of new catalyst systems is the need for more efficient synthesis of chemical compounds essential to modern life. Catalysts having superior performance offer significant environmental and economic advantages, but their discovery is not trivial. Well-defined, homogeneous catalysts can offer unparalleled understanding of ligand effects, which proves invaluable in directing redesign strategies. This thesis work focuses on the design of ruthenium complexes for applications in dinitrogen activation and olefin metathesis. The complexes developed create new directions in small-molecule activation and asymmetric catalysis by late-metal complexes. Also examined are the dual challenges, ubiquitous in catalysis, of adequate interrogation of catalyst structure and performance. Insight into both is essential to enable correlation of ligand properties with catalyst activity and/or selectivity. Improved methods for accelerated assessment of catalyst performance are described, which expand high-throughput catalyst screening to encompass parallel acquisition of kinetic data. A final aspect focuses on direct examination of metal complexes, both as isolated species, and under catalytic conditions. Applications of charge-transfer MALDI mass spectrometry to structural elucidation in organometallic chemistry is described, and the technique is employed to gain insight into catalyst decomposition pathways under operating conditions.

A major driving force for development of new catalyst systems is the need for more efficient synthesis of chemical compounds essential to modern life. Catalysts having superior performance offer significant environmental and economic advantages, but their discovery is not trivial. Well-defined, homogeneous catalysts can offer unparalleled understanding of ligand effects, which proves invaluable in directing redesign strategies. This thesis work focuses on the design of ruthenium complexes for applications in dinitrogen activation and olefin metathesis. The complexes developed create new directions in small-molecule activation and asymmetric catalysis by late-metal complexes. Also examined are the dual challenges, ubiquitous in catalysis, of adequate interrogation of catalyst structure and performance. Insight into both is essential to enable correlation of ligand properties with catalyst activity and/or selectivity. Improved methods for accelerated assessment of catalyst performance are described, which expand high-throughput catalyst screening to encompass parallel acquisition of kinetic data. A final aspect focuses on direct examination of metal complexes, both as isolated species, and under catalytic conditions. Applications of charge-transfer MALDI mass spectrometry to structural elucidation in organometallic chemistry is described, and the technique is employed to gain insight into catalyst decomposition pathways under operating conditions.

<p>  </p> <p>Aromatic C-N bond formation is critical for synthetic chemistry in pharmaceutical, agrochemical, and natural product synthesis. Due to the prevalence of this bond class, many synthetic routes have been developed over time to meet the demand. The most recent and robust C-N bond formation reaction is the palladium catalyzed Buchwald-Hartwig amination. Considering the importance of the Buchwald-Hartwig amination, a high-throughput experimentation (HTE) campaign was devised to create a library in which chemists can refer to optimal reaction conditions and ligand/catalyst choice based on the nature of their substrates to be coupled. This study showed trends for the appropriate choice of ligand and catalyst, along with what bases, temperatures, stoichiometries, and solvents are appropriate for the selected substrate combination at hand. </p>

Contemporary challenges in synthetic organic chemistry require innovative solutions. The discovery of highly-effective and readily accessible scaffolds drives the ever expanding scope of catalytic transformations. This dissertation outlines the repurposing of 1,5-Diaza-3,7-diphosphacyclooctanes (P₂N₂) ligands, commonly employed in inorganic or coordination chemistry, towards organic cross-coupling reactions. Despite their prominence in energy-storage applications, P₂N₂ ligands have been underexplored in catalytic C-C bond formation reactions. Chapter 1 provides a detailed introduction to late transition metal catalysis and the history of P₂N₂ ligands. Chapter 2 outlines the discovery of P^(Cy)₂N^(ArCF3)₂ as a powerful P₂N₂ ligand for the Ni-catalyzed reductive cross-coupling of aryl iodides with aldehydes. Chapter 3 details the extrapolation of the Ni/P^(Cy)₂N^(ArCF3)₂ catalyst system to the related, but less established, redox-neutral α-arylation of primary alcohols. Chapter 4 highlights the applicability of P₂N₂ ligands towards Ni- and Pd-catalyzed Mizoroki-Heck reactions. High-throughput experimentation (HTE) indicated a range of hits with P₂N₂ ligands compared to established ligands in Heck-type couplings. We discovered that absolute site selectivity of C-C bond formation could be controlled by simply altering the phosphorus substituent on the P₂N₂ ligand for the coupling of aryl triflates with styrenes. Notably, this degree of selectivity was not observed with conventional ligands. Chapter 5 focuses on the preparation of the P₂N₂ ligands. Finally, chapter 6 offers a perspective on future developments of P₂N₂ ligands and the prospective directions of their application in transition metal-catalyzed transformations.

High-throughput experimentation (HTE) is a form of accelerated testing which allows for many hundreds or thousands of experiments to be conducted in parallel or in rapid sequence. Recent advances in chemical reaction miniaturization have enabled HTE application toward chemical reaction exploration, and the resultant datasets present exciting opportunities for the incorporation of machine learning (ML) with organic chemistry to expedite reaction optimization and discovery. Disclosed herein is a modular HTE chemistry reaction platform with rapid and inexpensive data acquisition capabilities for training ML algorithms on organic chemistry. Comprising almost entirely off-the-shelf components and algorithms which will be made open-source, this platform facilitates data democratization through distributed generation. Underpinning this workflow is an innovative titration-based analysis method for semi-automated and quantitative conversion data acquisition at a rate of under fifteen seconds per sample. Requisite to this platform’s success are solutions to solid and liquid reagent distribution, reaction incubation, and fast, quantitative reaction analysis which is demonstrated in a proof-of-concept screening of the SNAr reaction toward the synthesis of proteolysis targeting chimera (PROTACs). It is hoped this platform lowers the barrier for entry to HTE for chemists through its modularity, approachability, and low operating costs. / 2024-06-16T00:00:00Z