Hydrocarbon oxidations catalyzed by azide- or nitride-activated metal coordination complexes.

摘要

Hydrocarbons, and particularly lower molecular weight alkanes and cycloalkanes, may readily be oxidized with air or O2 to form such products as alcohols, ketones, and the like selectively in high yields when there is employed as the catalyst a highly active azide- or nitride- activated metal coordination complex having the structure where M is a transition metal; " @@" is a ligand; and X is azide or nitride. Certain dimeric forms of these catalysts may also be employed. It has also been discovered that Group IV through VIII transition metal nitrides are also effective oxidation catalysts for lower molecular weight hydrocarbons such as alkanes. The invention is also directed to certain novel azide-activated metal coordination complex catalysts per se.