DEHYDROGENATIVE COUPLING OF ALKYL OR ARYL SILANES CATALYZED BY TI(O-I-PR)(4)

Oligo (monosubstituted silanediyl)s have attracted much interest as a component of advanced materials and also as a source of silylenes. Ti( O-i-Pr)(4), which is cheap and easily available, selectively catalyzes dehydrogenative coupling of aryl- or alkylsilanes to give oligo(alkyl or arylsilanediyl)s up to tetrasilanes. This indicates the possibilit ies of developing new catalysts for the dehydrogenative coupling based on non-metallocene complexes. Although MeTi(O-i-Pr)(3) exhibits catal ytic activities similar to Ti(O-i-Pr)(4), many other group 3 or 4 meta l alkoxides are inactive for the reaction. Ti(O-i-Pr)(4) also catalyze s hydrosilylation of alkenes with monosubstituted silanes under simila r conditions suggestive of the intermediacy of Ti-H or Ti-Si species i n both catalytic cycles.