Preparation and reactivity of compounds containing a carbon-xenon bond

The chemistry of carbon-xenon compounds is one of the newest in the field of organoelement chemistry. The specific character of carbon-xenon chemistry can be ascribed to the fact that in all Xe-II and Xe-IV compounds hypervalent bonds-symmetrical or asymmetrical- with a high partial positive charge on Xe are present. Different from the class of high-oxidation-state organometallic derivatives of d metals, C-Xe compounds have low coordination numbers and, additionally, contain three or two lone electron pairs. It is the intent of this review to present the still limited number of synthetic approaches to C-Xe compounds and to organize their presently known reactivities into categories. It is hoped that C-Xe compounds can be introduced in the future as precursors in synthetic organic and organoelement chemistry.