The mechanism of the N-alkylation of amines with alcohols catalyzed by an iridium complex containing an N-heterocyclic carbene (NHC) ligand with a tethered alcohol/alkoxide functionality was investigated by a combination of experimental and computational methods. The catalyst resting state is an iridium hydride species containing the amine substrate as a ligand, and decoordination of the amine, followed by coordination of the imine intermediate to the iridium center, constitute the rate-determining step (rds) of the catalytic process. The alcohol/alkoxide that is tethered to the NHC participates in every step of the catalytic cycle by accepting or releasing protons and forming hydrogen bonds with the reacting species. Thus, the iridium complex with the alcohol/alkoxide tethered to the N-heterocyclic carbene ligand acts as a bifunctional catalyst.

Bifunctional complexes bearing N-heterocyclic carbene (NHC) ligands functionalized with hydroxy or amine groups were synthesized to measure the beneficial effect of different modes of metal–ligand cooperation in the acceptorless dehydrogenation of alcohols. In comparison to complexes with an amine moiety, hydroxy-functionalized iridium catalysts showed superior activity. In contrast to alcohols, 1,4-diols underwent cyclization to give the corresponding tetrahydrofurans without involving dehydrogenation processes. Mechanistic investigations to rationalize the “OH effect” in these types of complexes have been undertaken.

Here we describe the topological transformation of the pores of a new framework in the bio-MOF-100 family (dia-c) into the known isomer (lcs) by doubling the pore volume, which occurs during postsynthesis modifications. During this transformation, reassembling of the metal–organic framework (MOF) building blocks into a completely different framework occurs, involving breaking/forming of metal–ligand bonds. MOF crystallinity and local structure are retained, as determined by powder X-ray diffraction (PXRD) and pair distribution function (PDF) analyses, respectively. We exploited the inherent dynamism of bio-MOF-100 by coupling chemical decorations of the framework using solvent-assisted ligand exchange to the topological change. Following this method and starting from the pristine dense dia-c phase, open lcs-bio-MOF-100 was prepared and functionalized in situ with an iridium complex (IrL). Alternatively, the dia-c MOF could be modified with wide-ranging amounts of IrL up to ca. 50 mol %, as determined by solution ¹H NMR spectroscopy, by tuning the concentration of the solutions used and with no evidence for isomer transformation. The single-site nature of the iridium complexes within the MOFs was assessed by X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS) and PDF analyses. Ligand exchanges occurred quantitatively at room temperature, with no need of excess of the iridium metallolinker.