9412837 Cutler Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Dr. Alan R. Cutler, Chemistry Department, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, is supported by the Inorganic, Bioinorganic, and Organometallic Chemistry Program of the Chemistry Division for research into the activation of carbon dioxide by metal complexes. Complexes which contain a carbon dioxide attached to both an early and a late transition metal will be studied in order to evaluate how synergism between the two metals may stabilize the interactions between carbon dioxide and the metals. As a portion of this phase of the study, the insertion of carbon dioxide into metal-metal bonds will be evaluated as a new route to the complexes. Utilizing complexes in which carbon dioxide is bonded to iron and to a catalytically active metal center, catalytic hydrosilation of the coordinated carbon dioxide will be developed. Carbon dioxide is a plentiful, sometimes environmentally undesirable material which potentially could be utilized as a feedstock by the chemical industry. This project will examine ways in which the normally unreactive carbon dioxide can be activated by interactions with metals. As part of the study as method of converting carbon dioxide to a compound which can be utilized in further chemical reactions will be devised.
