UC San Diego

Electron-poor ligands that also contain a pendant basic or acidic functional group should provide improved conditions and catalytic performance in a variety of reactions, such as anti-Markovnikov addition of O-H compounds such as water, alcohols, and carboxylic acids to terminal alkenes, a highly-sought reaction for which there is no good general solution. A second application is alkoxycarbonylation reactions of aryl halides to make esters. A strategy to synthesize electron-poor monophosphines or (bis)phosphines was developed. The analysis of the electron-poor phosphines using coordinating-ion-spray high resolution mass spectrometry was developed due to the inability of the ligands (or water- and air-sensitive precursors) alone was often not successful. Initial results in testing electron-poor phosphines with either pendant OH or OCH3 functionality as part of a metal complex for alkoxycarbonylation catalysis is reported.