Chem. Commun., 2025, Accepted Manuscript DOI: 10.1039/D5CC04534G, Communication Lucie Groth, Dirk Bockfeld, Matthias Tamm N-Heterocyclic carbene complexes of alkali metals (M = Na, K, Rb, Cs) were prepared from the zwitterionic trimethylsilylimidazolium borate [(C6F5)3B(IDipp)SiMe3 (1) by reaction with the corresponding alkali metal tert-butoxides MOtBu....