Coordination chemistry of p-block element Lewis acceptors: Applying principles of transition metal chemistry to non-metal elements

新化合物的合成和表征是发现新药物、生产商品化学品的新催化剂和具有新性能的新材料的基础，这些新材料在社会上具有潜在的功能，包括新的电解液、导电聚合物、阻燃剂、弹性体和生物医学材料。我们社会中使用的大多数工业上重要的催化剂都涉及低丰度的贵金属(如铂、铑)，而社会中使用的大多数合成聚合物材料都是由碳基骨架组成的。相对丰富的P-嵌段元素(如硅、锗、锡、磷、锑、铋、硫和硒)的新合成化合物为催化剂和新的聚合物材料的分子构建块提供了经济高效的替代品。此外，许多p-块元素的独特化学仍在开发中，这为发现新的反应性和具有新的物理性质的化合物/材料提供了机会。 Burford NSERC发现基金将支持开发具有p-块元素的化合物的新合成方法。已经证明对磷化合物有效的合成方法将被外推到其他p-块元素。建议的研究为p-块元素提供了系统的配位化学应用，以发现新的Lewis酸性物种，使过渡金属元素的应用成为可能。目标化合物将具有高分子正电荷，以在p-嵌段中心实现异常的反应性，以发现激活键和小分子的新方法，实现元素-元素键形成的新方法，并开发扩展框架，最终用作低聚物和聚合物的构建块。该研究计划提供了一个系统的研究，以评估各种氧化态和分子电荷的特点p-块元素可获得的。 这一研究计划正在改变，并将继续改变化学家理解P-块元素化学的方式，以及社会如何更有效地利用具有成本效益的P-块元素。拟议的研究项目将提供 在合成化学、表征技术、固态结构、化学反应和计算建模方面为本科生、研究生和博士后研究员提供出色的培训。此外，同事还可以在世界级的设备和仪器方面积累丰富的经验。这些广泛的经验很容易被转移到各种职业道路上，而以前的同事在获得学术界和工业界的任命方面有着出色的记录。

The synthesis and characterization of new compounds represents a fundamental foundation in the discovery of new pharmaceuticals, new catalysts for the production of commodity chemicals, and new materials exhibiting new properties, with potential function in society including new electrolytes, conducting polymers, flame retardants, elastomers and biomedical materials. Most industrially important catalysts employed in our society involve low abundance precious metals (e.g. platinum, rhodium) and most synthetic polymeric materials employed in society are composed of carbon based backbones. New synthetic compounds of the relatively abundant p-block elements (such as silicon, germanium, tin, phosphorus, antimony, bismuth, sulfur and selenium) offer cost-effective alternatives for catalysts and as molecular building blocks for new polymeric materials. Moreover, the distinct chemistry of many of the p-block elements, still under development, offers the discovery of new reactivity and compounds/materials with new physical properties. The Burford NSERC Discovery Grant will support the development of new synthetic methods for compounds featuring the p-block elements. Synthetic methods that have proven effectiveness for compounds of phosphorus will be extrapolated to the other the p-block elements. The proposed research offers the systematic application of coordination chemistry for the p-block elements to discover new Lewis acidic species, enabling the application of principles that are well established for the transition metal elements. The target compounds will have high molecular positive charges to effect exceptional reactivity at the p-block centers to discover new approaches for the activation of bonds and small molecules, to realise new approaches to element-element bond formation, and to develop extended frameworks to ultimately be used as building blocks for oligomers and polymers. The research program offers a systematic study that assesses the variety of oxidation states and molecular charges accessible for the featured p-block elements. This research program is changing, and will continue to change the way in which chemists understand the chemistry of the p-block elements and how society can make more effective use of the cost effective p-block elements. The proposed research projects will offer excellent training for undergraduate students, graduate students and postdoctoral fellows in synthetic chemistry, characterization techniques, solid state structure, chemical reactivity and computational modeling. In addition, co-workers are able to develop extensive experience with world class equipment and instrumentation. These broad range of experiences are readily transferred to a variety of career paths and former co-workers have an excellent record of obtaining appointments in academia and industry.