Reactivity of phosphaalkyne tBuCP toward a Ga‐functionalized germylene

Abstract

Phosphaalkynes are the heavier congener of nitriles which feature a polarized Cδ−≡Pδ+ triple bond. Since the isolation of the first phosphaalkyne in 1981, these compounds have become important ligands for transition metals and valuable building blocks in synthetic chemistry. The reported reactivity with germylenes is rare, to expand this chemistry, we studied the reactivity of the recently developed gallium‐substituted germylene 1 ([LPhGe–Ga(Cl)LBDI] (LPh = PhC(NtBu)2; LBDI = [{2,6‐iPr2C6H3NCMe}2CH]) with tBuC≡P. Already at room temperature, insertion of the phosphaalkyne into the Ga–Ge bond occurred, resulting a metal‐functionalized (Z)‐phosphaalkenyl complex [LPhGe{C(tBu)=P}–Ga(Cl)LBDI] (2). Complex 2 was characterized by single crystal X‐ray diffraction analysis and spectroscopic methods (1H, 13C{1H}, 31P{1H} NMR and IR).