Using Soluble Polymers to Enforce Catalyst‐Phase‐Selective Solubility and as Antileaching Agents to Facilitate Homogeneous Catalysis

Abstract

AbstractThe enforced phase‐selective solubility of polyisobutylene (PIB)‐bound RhII catalysts in biphasic heptane/acetonitrile mixtures can be used not only to recycle these catalysts but also to minimize bimolecular reactions with ethyl diazoacetate. When cyclopropanation and OH insertion reactions are carried out with PIB‐bound RhII catalysts either with or without addition of an unfunctionalized hydrocarbon polymer cosolvent, dimer by‐product formation is suppressed even without slow syringe pump addition of the ethyl diazoacetate. This suppression of by‐product formation is shown to be due to increased phase segregation of the soluble polymer‐bound catalyst and the ethyl diazoacetate reactant. These studies also reveal that added hydrocarbon polymer cosolvents can function as antileaching agents, decreasing the already small amount of a soluble polymer‐bound species that leaches into a polar phase in a biphasic mixture during a liquid/liquid separation step.