Gmelin Handbook of Inorganic and Organometallic Chemistry

The significance of organometallic chemistry has constantly increased during the second half of this century. The Gmelin Institute is responding to this development by the edition of the volume Organo-Beryllium Compounds 1. This volume describes all organoberyllium compounds containing at least one beryllium-carbon bound except the beryllium carbides and cyanides. Organoberyllium chemistry has never been a very popular field, and only a few workers have contributed to its slow growth, as is seen by the relatively small number of publications in the field. This unusual neglect of a branch of organometallic chemistry is only partly due to the very limited number of potential applications of beryllium and its compounds. The compounds of this element are in principle at least as interesting and triguing to scientists as those of other metals in the Periodic Table. No doubt the main reason for the apparent ban on experimental organoberyllium chemistry is to be found in the established, and alleged, hazardous properties of beryllium compounds. The volume covers the literature completely to the end of 1986 and includes most of the references up to mid-1987.