Project Grant 2154359

This three-year, $480,000 Project Grant from the National Science Foundation's Division of Chemistry and Mathematical and Physical Sciences program will support the development of sustainable catalysts and dehydrocoupling chemistry at Arizona State University. Principal Investigator Ryan J. Trovitch will study trends in earth-abundant metal catalysts to synthesize value-added chemicals and polymers more efficiently. Initial work will target precursors for semiconductor manufacturing. The project will also explore coatings for construction and transportation, chemical vapor deposition compounds, quantum dot precursors, and reagents for organic synthesis. Physical techniques will elucidate design principles for manganese, iron, cobalt, and nickel catalysts to dehydrogenatively couple main group hydrides. Isostructural series of arene diimine ligands will be evaluated for aminosilane and amine dehydrocoupling, with the most effective used to prepare industrially-relevant monomers and polymers. Successful catalysts will be screened for additional main group couplings, including precursors for chemical and atomic layer deposition with N-Ge, N-Al, and Ga-P bonds and quantum dot syntheses featuring P-Si and P-Ge bonds. An undergraduate laboratory guide and coursework on sustainable synthesis will broaden participation in chemistry.