Novel Clusters of Cobalt and Nickel with Organophosphorus Ligands

Abstract

A surprisingly easy access to the preparation of transition‐metal clusters is the reaction of MCl 2 (M  Co, Ni) with PhP(SiMe 3 ) 2 and PPh 3 . In this way [Co 4 (μ 3 ‐PPh) 4 (PPh 3 ) 4 ] and [Ni 8 (X) 4 (μ 4 ‐PPh) 6 (PPh 3 ) 4 ] (XCl and CO) can be isolated. The paramagnetic complex with X  Cl contains 116 valence electrons and can be considered as a mixed‐valence cluster of Ni 0 and Ni 1+ .