Dinitrogen Formation by Oxidative Intramolecular N-N Coupling in cis,cis-[(bpy)2(NH3)RuORu(NH3)(bpy)2]4+

The N-labeled diammine(oxo)ruthenium complex cis,cis-[(bpy)2(H3N)Ruʹ"ORuʹVNH3)(bpy)2] ((2-N)) was synthesized from cis,cis-[(bpy)2(H20)Ruʹ"ORuʹ"(H20)(bpy)2 by using (....) and isolated as its perchlorate salt in 17% yield. A 1:1 mixture of (2-N) and nonlabeled c/s,c/s-[(bpy)2(H3N)Ru"ʹORuʹVNH3)(bpy)2] were electrochemically oxidized in aqueous solution. The gaseous products 2 and 2 were formed in equimolar amounts with only a small amount of N N detected. This demonstrates that dinitrogen formation by oxidation of the diammine complex proceeds by intramolecular N-N coupling.