The well-defined aluminum monohydride compound [{(2,4,6-Me3-C6H2)NC(Me)}2(Me)(H)]AlH·(NMe2Et) (1) catalyzes hydroboration of a wide range of aldehydes and ketones under mild reaction conditions. Moreover, compound 1 displayed chemoselective hydroboration of aldehydes over ketones at rt.

Being the third most abundant transition metal in the Earth’s crust (after iron and titanium) and less toxic, reactions catalyzed by manganese are becoming very important. A large number of manganese complexes have been synthesized using bidentate and tridentate ligands. Such manganese complexes display excellent catalytic activities for various important organic transformations, such as hydrogenation, dehydrogenation, dehydrogenative coupling, transfer hydrogenation reactions, etc. In this short review, recent developments of such manganese-catalyzed reactions are presented.1 Introduction2 Well-Defined Manganese-Complex-Catalyzed Hydrogenation Reactions2.1 Hydrogenation of Nitriles2.2 Hydrogenation of Aldehydes and Ketones2.3 Hydrogenation of Esters2.4 Hydrogenation of Amides2.5 Hydrogenation of Carbon Dioxide3 Manganese-Catalyzed Dehydrogenation Reactions3.1 Selective Dehydrogenation of Methanol3.2 Dehydrogenative N-Formylation of Amines by Methanol3.3 Dehydrogenative Coupling Reactions of Alcohols3.4 Imine Synthesis via Dehydrogenative Coupling of Alcohols and Amines3.5 Synthesis of N-Heterocycles via Dehydrogenative Coupling4 Manganese-Catalyzed Dehydrogenation–Hydrogenation Cascades4.1 N-Alkylation of Amines with Primary Alcohols4.2 α-Alkylation of Ketones with Primary Alcohols4.3 Transfer Hydrogenation of Ketones5 Conclusion

Scheme 1. Mn-catalyzed hydrogen-autotransfer strategy for the a-alkylation of ketones with alcohols.

Herein, we present the first catalytic direct olefination of methyl-substituted heteroarenes with primary alcohols through an acceptorless dehydrogenative coupling. The reaction is catalyzed by a complex of the earth-abundant transition metal manganese that is stabilized by a bench-stable NNN pincer ligand derived from 2-hydrazinylpyridine. The reaction is environmentally benign, producing only hydrogen and water as byproducts. A large number of E-disubstituted olefins were selectively obtained with high efficiency.

Magnesium amide complexes such as Mg{N(SiMe)} (1) LMgN(SiMe)·THF (2) [L = ArNC(NPr)NAr; (Ar = 2,6-Me-CH)] and LMgN(SiMe)·THF (3) [L = ArNC(NPr)NAr; (Ar = 2,6-Pr-CH)] are reported as highly efficient pre-catalysts for the hydroboration of a wide range of esters using pinacolborane (HBpin) under mild reaction conditions. Moreover, we have shown compound 1 catalyzed chemoselective reduction of esters in the presence of other reducible functional groups such as alkene, alkyne and nitro.