Dedicated to Professor M . Frederick Hawthorne on the occasion of his 65th birthday Hawthorne et a1 reported the syntheses of the first complexes containing nido-C, B,H, ligands in 1965,['] thus heralding the beginnings of metallacarborane chemistry which they then systematically elaborated.[21 Of the smaller carboranes, the nido-C,B,H, ligand, which contains five less BH groups, also displays a high synthetic potential.[3] The metallacarborane clusters 1 and 2 (M = Fe, Co) are well-known complexes containing these ligands, and may-if regarded as x complexes-be considered as forming a bridge to the metallocenes. The iron compounds lc4] and 215] (M = Fe) are paramagnetic complexes (1 7 valence electrons (VE)), which react by taking up one additional electron to form the diamagnetic anions 1-and 2-(M = Fe), the analogues of ferrocene. The buildup of neutral 18 VE complexes requires either the substitution of the C,H, ligand by C,H,, or the replacement of the C,B, carboranes (n = 4, 9) by the 5e ligand nido-C,B,R,, which would lead to the formation of 3. We report here on the (tricarbahexaborany1)iron complex 3a which is analogous to ferrocene, and on the first 16 VE iron sandwich compound 7.
3We have observed the metal-induced formation of 2,3,5-tricarbahexaboranylnickel complexes[6] by rearrangement of bis(2,3-dihydro-l,3-diborole)nickel complexes at room temperature and have recently been able to synthesize the unknown 2,3,5-tricarbahexaborane 5 by two different routes. The hydroboration of 1,3-diethyl-2-methyl-4,5-diisopropylidene-l,3-diborolane (4) ['] with (HBEt,), leads rather surprisingly to a 2: 1 mixture of the carborane 5['] and the 1,3-diborole 6, which can be deprotonated to the corresponding anions (5-H)-and (6-H)-by the action of NaH or LiMe, respectively.