Assigning the ESI mass spectra of organometallic and coordination compounds

Organometallic compounds are a class of substances containing at least one metal‐to‐carbon bond in which the carbon is part of an organic group. These constitute a very large group of substances that are often used as catalysts and as intermediates in the laboratory and in industry. Overall, organometallic compounds continue to play a significant role in the development of chemistry. In this tutorial special feature article, Scott McIndoe and Krista Vikse briefly summarize the techniques that are commonly used to assign any ESI‐MS spectrum, and the various types of ions one is likely to observe from organometallic systems or coordination compounds. They then suggest a systematic procedure specifically designed for the ESI‐MS analysis of organometallic and coordination systems and demonstrate its usefulness through two case studies. J. Scott McIndoe is Professor of Chemistry at the University of Victoria (Victoria BC, Canada). Krista L. Vikse is Assistant Professor of Chemistry at San Francisco State University (San Fransisco CA, USA). Their research interests are centered in organometallic catalysis and synthesis, and the development and use of novel MS (and orthogonal spectroscopic) techniques to enable rapid catalyst discovery, mechanism elucidation and reaction optimization via real‐time analysis.