Base metal-catalyzed nitrene transfers to isocyanides

Isocyanides are versatile building blocks that behave like chemical chameleons. They act as nucleophiles, electrophiles, radical acceptors, or carbenes. All of this generates a plethora of reactions, which have been explored over the past decades. Transition metal catalyzed iscoyanide reactions have become an emerging field since 2010 and still holds plenty of room for improvement. Most of these transformations are facilitated with palladium, however, in recent years base metals have been employed more. The focus on base metals (earth abundant metals) is becoming ever more important to facilitate a more sustainable world. Currently, our group is working in a joint-degree with the University of Antwerp on a base metal catalyzed isocyanide insertions project, in which my research focus lies. In this project, we will focus on the synthesis of heterocycles through the different mechanisms present in base metal catalysis of isocyanides (figure 1).

List of Publications

1. R. Roose, D. S. Verdoorn, P. Mampuys, E. Ruijter, B. U. W. Maes, R. V. A. Orru, Chem. Soc. Rev., 2022, 51, 5842-5877.
2. Horst, D. S. Verdoorn, S. Hennig, G. van der Heijden, E. Ruijter, Angew. Chem. Int. Ed., 2022, In print: https://doi.org/10.1002/anie.202210592.