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  • Title: Computational mechanistic study of the hydrogenation of carbonate to methanol catalyzed by the Ru(II)PNN complex.
    Author: Li H, Wen M, Wang ZX.
    Journal: Inorg Chem; 2012 May 21; 51(10):5716-27. PubMed ID: 22568879.
    Abstract:
    Density functional theory computations have been carried out to study the mechanism of hydrogenation-based transformation of dimethyl carbonate to methanol, catalyzed by Ru(II)PNN catalyst. The energetic results show that the catalytic transformation includes three sequential stages consistently involving the catalyst: (stage I) transformation of dimethyl carbonate (3) to methyl formate (5) and methanol; (stage II) transformation of methyl formate 5 to formaldehyde and methanol; (stage III) hydrogenation of formaldehyde to methanol. Stages I and II proceed similarly and follow three steps: hydrogen activation, formation of a hemiacetal intermediate via stepwise hydrogen transfer to dimethyl carbonate in stage I or methyl fomate in stage II, and subsequent decomposition of the hemiacetal intermediate to afford methanol. Hydrogenation via carbonyl insertion into the Ru-H bond is less favorable than the stepwise hydrogen-transfer mechanism. Decomposition of hemiacetal takes places by first breaking the hemiacetal O-H bond to give an alkoxide complex, followed by deprotonation of the benzylic arm ligand to the adjacent methoxy group. Comparing the hydrogenation steps in the three stages, hydrogenation in stage I is most difficult, that in stage II is less difficult, and that in stage III is easiest in terms of both kinetics and thermodynamics. This can be ascribed to the stronger electrophilicity of the carbonyl group in methyl formate or formaldehyde than that in dimethyl carbonate and fewer steric effects between the catalyst and methyl formate or formaldehyde than that between the catalyst and dimethyl carbonate. Thermodynamically, both stages I and II are uphill, but stage III is downhill significantly, which is the driving force for the catalytic transformation. The study indicates that the methanol product could facilitate the hydrogen activation involved in the transformation, implying that transformation could be accelerated by initially adding methanol.
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