From Catalysts to Bioactive Organometallics: Do Grubbs Catalysts Trigger Biological Effects?

Ruthenium complexes of the Grubbs type have had an enormous impact on modern synthetic organic chemistry, which was honored by awarding Grubbs, Schrock, and Chauvin with the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2005 for the development of metathesis methods. Grubbs catalysts are transition metal carbene complexes, consisting of a central benzylidene dichlororuthenium core with additional phosphine or N-heterocyclic carbene (NHC) ligands. In Hoveyda–Grubbs catalysts the central benzylidene ligand carries an additional isopropyloxo group coordinated to the ruthenium by its oxygen atom, replacing one of the phosphine groups. Nowadays, these orga-