A principle for the assembly of novel mononuclear building blocks for supramolecular chemistry

Abstract

Abstract The controlled assembly of supramolecular coordination oligomers may be achieved by the use of multinucleating ligands which contain two or more metal-binding domains. Examples of such ligands commonly consist of discrete metal-binding sites linked by appropriate spacers. We now show that a consideration of the donor properties of a ligand and the acceptor properties of a metal ion may be used to induce multinucleating behaviour in oligopyridine ligands which conventionally chelate to single metal centres. Such species are key building blocks for the assembly of a variety of supramolecular species in which the non-coordinated donor atoms may later interact with other metal centres. The crystal structure of the complex [Ru(bpy-N,N′)2(tpy-N,N′)][PF6]2 ( P 1, a = 8.367(2), b = 11.821(4), c = 19.398(5)Å, α = 93.83(2), β = 92.25(2), γ = 89.62(2)°, Z = 2, d c = 1.63 g cm−3, 5084 unique observed reflections with I < 1.5σ(I), R = 0.0745) which contains a bidentate tpy ligand is presented.