Oxidative addition of silicon hydrides to hydridocarbonyltris(triphenylphosphine)iridium(I)

Abstract

Complexes have been prepared by oxidation of hydridocarbonyltris(triphenylphosphine)iridium(I) with a variety of silicon hydrides. The complexes were very stable with respect to thermal loss of either silicon hydride or molecular hydrogen.An unequivocal assignment of stereochemistry of the complexes was obtained from a combination of infrared and proton nuclear magnetic resonance (n.m.r.) techniques. Addition of the silicon hydride to the iridium complex was found to be stereospecifically cis.