Abstract
Oxidative cleavage of alkenes to carboxylic acids catalyzed by cis-[RuCl
2
(bipy)
2
] · 2H
2
O in the presence of IO(OH)
5
has been studied in a biphasic (CH
3
CN-CCl
4
-H
2
O; 1∶1∶2 v/v) solvent system. Ruthenium tetraoxide seems to be the active catalyst species.