The continually growing contribution of transition metal chemistry to synthetic organic chemistry is, of course, widely recognized. Equally well known is the difficulty in keeping up-to-date with the multifarious reactions and procedures that seem to be spawned at an ever-increasing rate. These can certainly be summarized on the basis of reviews under the headings of the individual transition metals. More useful to the bench organic chemist, however, would be the opposite type of concordance based on the structural type of the desired synthetic product. This is the approach taken in the...

Since the publication of our earlier book on transition metal mediated organic synthesis, * there has been a widespread increase of interest in this topic, and transition metal based methodology has become firmly established in many areas of organic chemistry. The direct, catalytic formation of organic carbonyl compounds using carbon monoxide as the source of the carbonyl group has seen exceptional progress, and this carbonylation chemistry is being used increasingly in research and on a larger scale for fine chemicals production. In view of these developments, there is a need for a modem,...