Manganese-Catalyzed Hydrofunctionalization of Alkenes

The manganese-catalyzed hydrosilylation and hydroboration of alkenes has been developed using a single manganese(II) precatalyst and reaction protocol. Both reactions proceed with excellent control of regioselectivity and in high yields across a variety of sterically and electronically differentiated substrates (25 examples). Alkoxide activation, using (NaOBu)-Bu-t, was key to precatalyst activation and reactivity. Catalysis was achieved across various functional groups and on gram-scale for both the developed methodologies with catalysts loadings as low as 0.5 mol %.