Introduction to Organometallic Chemistry

Abstract

Organometallic chemistry is a branch of coordination chemistry and deals with compounds which have at least one metal-carbon bond. Since metals are more electropositive than carbon it is considered that the metal-carbon bond is slightly polarised; localizing a small negative charge on carbon and a small positive charge on the metal (i.e., Mδ+–Cδ–). Organic ligands which are coordinated to transition metals can be classified according to (i) hapticity of the ligand and (ii) the number of metal atoms directly bonded to a ligand (i.e., bridging ligands).