A Cp^tt -Based Trioxo-Rhenium Catalyst for the Deoxydehydration of Diols and Polyols

Trioxo-rhenium complexes are well known catalysts for the deoxydehydration (DODH) of vicinal diols (glycols). In this work, we report on the DODH of diols and biomass-derived polyols using CpttReO3 as a new catalyst (Cptt=1,3-di-tert-butylcyclopentadienyl). The DODH reaction was optimized using 2 mol % of CpttReO3 and 3-octanol as both reductant and solvent. The CpttReO3 catalyst exhibits an excellent activity for biomass-derived polyols. Specifically, glycerol is almost quantitatively converted to allyl alcohol and mucic acid gives 75 % of muconates at 91 % conversion. In addition, the loading of CpttReO3 can be reduced to 0.1 mol % to achieve a turn-over number as high as 900 per Re when using glycerol as substrate. Examination of DODH reaction profiles by NMR spectroscopy indicates that catalysis is related to Cp-ligand release, which raises questions on the nature of the actual catalyst.