Overcoming the Inertness of Iridium(III) in a Facile Single-Crystal to Single-Crystal Reaction of Iodine Vapor with a Cyclometalated Chloride Monomer

Stanislav I Bezzubov; Paulina Kalle; Alfiya A Bilyalova; Sergei V Tatarin; Vladimir D Dolzhenko

doi:10.1002/chem.201801963

Overcoming the Inertness of Iridium(III) in a Facile Single-Crystal to Single-Crystal Reaction of Iodine Vapor with a Cyclometalated Chloride Monomer

Chemistry. 2018 Sep 3;24(49):12779-12783. doi: 10.1002/chem.201801963. Epub 2018 Aug 1.

Authors

Stanislav I Bezzubov¹, Paulina Kalle¹, Alfiya A Bilyalova², Sergei V Tatarin², Vladimir D Dolzhenko²

Affiliations

¹ Kurnakov Institute of General and Inorganic Chemistry, Russian Academy of Sciences, Leninskiy pr. 31, Moscow, 119991, Russia.
² Department of Chemistry, Lomonosov Moscow State University, Lenin's hills 1/3, Moscow, 119991, Russia.

PMID: 29939438
DOI: 10.1002/chem.201801963

Abstract

Iridium(III) is often considered to be one of the most inert octahedral metal ions. Herein we present a phenanthroimidazole-based bis-cyclometalated iridium(III) chloride undergoing a facile chloro ligand exchange with iodine, in a gas-solid reaction under ambient conditions. Monitoring the progress of the reaction by X-ray diffraction analysis reveals the crystal-packing-induced exceptional stereoselectivity of this topochemical transformation. The results provide excellent opportunities to modulate the geometry and kinetic properties of cyclometalated iridium(III) complexes that may be very promising in catalysis and design of anticancer agents.

Keywords: X-ray diffraction; cyclometalated complexes; iridium; ligand exchange; single-crystal to single-crystal reaction.