Organoscandium Chemistry

The element scandium has been known for over one hundred years, but its coordination chemistry has been little studied. The lack of attention has been due, in part, to the difficulty of obtaining a pure source of scandium, although both the metal and oxide are now commercially available in high purity.

Scandium is the first member of the 3d transition series and has a 3d1 4s2 ground state electronic configuration. The +III oxidation state is the only one known. It is in many respects quite similar to yttrium and the lanthanides although the distinctly smaller radius of the scandium(III) ion affords some noteworthy differences in chemistry.