Title: Adventures in Synthesis at the Bottom of the Periodic Table
Abstract: Actinide elements have reactivity that is very different from their transition metal and lanthanide counterparts. Their redox chemistry is especially different, since they can access highly oxidized ions and very electron rich species. In our laboratory, we have been taking advantage of the ability of these elements to attain high coordination numbers and support species with many actinide-element multiple bonds. In this presentation, a family of uranium imido complexes will be presented, along with a uranium(VI) pentakis(imido) tetranion and it’s reactivity. Recent progress in synthesis using transuranium elements will also be discussed, including new Lewis base adducts of neptunium tetrachloride. Spectroscopic, structural, magnetic and computational data that support formation of these new compounds will also be presented.
Bio: Suzanne C. Bart graduated from the University of Delaware with a B.S. in chemistry (2001), and earned her Ph.D. from Cornell University with Prof. Paul J. Chirik (2006). Following this, she was an Alexander von Humboldt Postdoctoral Fellow at the Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nuremberg under the direction of Prof. Dr. Karsten Meyer. In 2008, she became an assistant professor at Purdue University, was promoted to associate professor in 2014, and to professor in 2018. Her research interests include organometallic transformations mediated by organoactinide species, coordination chemistry of f-block elements, and elucidating electronic structures of metal complexes. Suzanne has been the recipient of a United States National Science Foundation CAREER award, and has been named a 2012 Cottrell Scholar from the Research Corporation for Science Advancement. She was named a 2014 Organometallics Young Investigator Fellow from the American Chemical Society, and a 2015 Rising Star from the Women Chemists Committee of the American Chemical Society. In 2024, she was awarded the F. Albert Cotton Award in Synthetic Inorganic Chemistry by the American Chemical Society. She currently serves as an Associate Editor for the ACS journal Inorganic Chemistry
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