Polymetallacarborane Stacks and Clusters: Designed Synthesis and Electronic Properties

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This award from the Inorganic, Bioinorganic, and Organometallic Chemistry Program supports the synthesis of new organometallic compounds containing transition metals and boron and carbon clusters. The research has two main goals: to develop systematic preparative routes to polymetallic complexes containing carboranes and diborols and to investigate the electronic structures and properties of these materials. Methods to construct multi-decker sandwiches layer by layer will first be developed, followed by techniques for linking those molecules together. In addition, some indenylmetallacarboranes of osmium and ruthenium will be prepared in order to test some metal insertion reactions which could provide an alternative mode of polyhedral expansion. In all cases, the compounds will be characterized both structurally and electrochemically, using techniques such as NMR, vis-UV spectroscopy, X-ray crystallography, cyclic voltammetry, and ESR spectroscopy. %%% The design and synthesis of chain-like molecules which have high electronic conductivities along the chain is a very active area of research because of the potential use of such molecules in molecular level electronic devices. This project involves the synthesis of molecules in which metal atoms are linked by five-membered rings of carbon and boron atoms in structures which resemble multi-decker sandwiches, with the five-membered rings serving as the "bread" and the metal atoms as the "meat." Communication between the metal atoms provides for conduction of electrons up and down the stack. The presence of boron provides high thermal stability and decreased sensitivity to oxidation by atmospheric oxygen.