Iron-Catalysed Hydrosilylation of Alkenes and Alkynes

Abstract

The hydrosilylation of alkenes represents one of the largest applications of homogeneous catalysis on an industrial scale, and currently uses precious transition-metal catalysts such as platinum. This chapter deals with the development of an iron-catalysed methodology for the hydrosilylation of alkenes and alkynes using a bench-stable iron(II) pre-catalyst, which could be activated in situ. The reaction scope and limitations are presented along with preliminary mechanistic studies, which lead to a discussion of possible reaction mechanisms and future work required to investigate this method further.