Ammonia Oxidation by Abstraction of Three Hydrogen Atoms from a Mo–NH 3 Complex
We report ammonia oxidation by homolytic cleavage of all three H atoms from a Mo৶ 15 NH 3 complex using the 2,4,6-tri-tert-butylphenoxyl radical to afford a Mo-alkylimido (Mo৶ 15 NR) complex (R = 2,4,6-tri-t-butylcyclohexa-2,5-dien-1-one). Reductive cleavage of Mo৶15NR generates a terminal Mo৶N nitride, and a [Mo৶ 15 NH] + complex is formed by protonation. Computational analysis describes the energetic profile for the stepwise removal of three H atoms from the Mo৶ 15 NH 3 complex and the formation of Mo৶ 15 NR. Acknowledgment. This work was supported as part of the Center for Molecular Electrocatalysis, an Energy Frontier Re-search Center funded by the U.S. Department of Energy (U.S. DOE), Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences. EPR and mass spectrometry experiments were performed using EMSL, a national scientific user facility sponsored by the DOE’s Office of Biological and Environmental Research and located at PNNL. The authors thank Dr. Eric D. Walter and Dr. Rosalie Chu for assistance in performing EPR and mass spectroscopy analysis, respectively. Computational resources provided by the National Energy Re-search Scientific Computing Center (NERSC) at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Pacific North-west National Laboratory is operated by Battelle for the U.S. DOE.