Two-electron reactions in organic and organometallic electrochemistry

The electrochemical oxidation or reduction of many organic and organometallic compounds proceeds by two or more individual electron-transfer reactions. In this paper, various aspects of such reactions are reviewed. These include the factors that govern the difference between the formal potentials for the two steps (E(1)degrees'E(2)degrees'), causes of potential inversion (E(1)degrees-E(2)degrees<0 for reductions) and mass transfer and kinetic effects associated with the disproportionation/comproportionation reaction among the three species involved in the two-step reaction.