Understanding the Exceptional Hydrogen-Atom Donor Characteristics of Water in TiIII-Mediated Free-Radical Chemistry

In recent years solid evidence of HAT reactions involving water as hydrogen atom source have been presented. In this work we demonstrate that the efficiency of titanocene(III) aqua complexes as an unique class of HAT reagents is based on two key features: (a) excellent binding capabilities of water toward titanocene(III) complexes and (b) a low activation energy for the HAT step. The theory has predictive capabilities fitting well with the experimental results and may aid to find more examples of this remarkable radical reaction.