Synthesis and Characterization of Metal Complexes to be Employed in the Catalytic Depolymerization of Lignin Model Compounds: Abstract No. INOR-606

Lignin is an earth-abundant biopolymer that is grossly underutilized as a value stream in current biomass conversion technologies because there exist no economic and technically feasible routes for lignin depolymerization and upgrading to fuels and chemicals. The development of new mild and selective catalytic routes to depolymerize this recalcitrant biopolymer is required to more effectivelyutilize lignin. To that end, our group aims to synthesize and characterize a collection of organometallic catalysts to promote atom-economical catalytic lignin deconstruction. These catalysts have been screened against dimeric lignin model compounds in order to gain mechanistic insights into their modes of action. In addition, experimental efforts have been coupled with quantum mechanicalcalculations to elucidate solution behavior of the catalysts as well as the mechanisms of lignin depolymerization. Detailed synthetic procedures, as well as spectroscopic and crystallographic characterization and DFT calculations will be presented.