Five-membered metallacycles of titanium and zirconium--attractive compounds for organometallic chemistry and catalysis.

In these days a renaissance of metallacycles as an increasingly important class of organometallic compounds for synthetic and catalytic applications is evident, making such very attractive for a plethora of investigations. Titanocene and zirconocene bis(trimethylsilyl)acetylene complexes, regarded as three-membered metallacycles (1-metallacyclopropenes), present a rich chemistry towards unsaturated molecules. By elimination of the alkyne these complexes form by reaction with unsaturated compounds five-membered titana- and zirconacycles, all of which are relevant to stoichiometric and catalytic C-C coupling and cleavage reactions of unsaturated molecules.