New adventures in the molecular chemistry of phosphorus

Angew Chem Int Ed Engl. 2009;48(27):4895-7. doi: 10.1002/anie.200900100.

Abstract

Teaching old dogs new tricks: Recent developments in low-coordinate phosphorus chemistry reveal the capacity of this element for surprises. For example, P for CR substitution in new phosphaalkynes was used to stabilize purported intermediates in an important synthetic transformation, and also to form new diphosphacyclobutadiene sandwich complexes (see scheme).