Metal-ligand cooperativity in a ruthenium(II) complex of bis-azoaromatic ligand for catalytic dehydrogenation of alcohols

Herein a new Ru-phosphine complex (1) with molecular formula [RuL(PPh3)Cl-2] is reported where L is a redox active pincer ligand 2,6-bis(phenylazo)pyridine. The isolated complex has been characterized by usual spectroscopic techniques including single crystal X-ray crystallographic analysis. Complex 1 efficiently catalyzes aerobic oxidation of a wide range of primary and secondary benzylic, allylic, heterocyclic, alicyclic alcohols under mild conditions and is found to be superior over several other Ru (0, +2 and + 3), Ru-H and Ru-PPh3 catalysts. Mechanistic studies indicate that a transient Ru-H intermediate is formed in the catalytic cycle which gets switched into a Ru-hydrazo intermediate via hydrogen-walking mechanism. The catalyst is regenerated by aerial oxidation producing H2O2 as a by-product.