Hydrogenation of Carbonyl Derivatives with a Well-Defined Rhenium Precatalyst

The first efficient and general rhenium-catalyzed hydrogenation of carbonyl derivatives was developed. The key to the success of the reaction was the use of a well-defined rhenium complex bearing a tridentate diphosphinoamino ligand as the catalyst (0.5 mol%) at 70 degrees C in the presence of H-2 (30 bar). The mechanism of the reaction was investigated by DFT(PBE0-D3) calculations.