Novel heterometallic Cd/Cu complexes prepared using zerovalent copper: control of the nuclearity and structural diversity by halide counterions

Three kinds of CdII/CuII compounds of different nuclearity: tetranuclear [Cd2Cu2I4L4(dmso)2] 1, pentanuclear [Cd2Cu3Br6L4(dmso)2] 2 and hexanuclear [Cd4Cu2Cl6L6(H2O)2] 3, have been synthesised by the reaction of zerovalent copper and cadmium halides with non-aqueous (dmso, CH3CN) solutions of 2-dimethylaminoethanol (HL) in air. The choice of counteranion in the initial cadmium salt provides a useful method of altering the nuclearity and structure of the heterometallic Cd/Cu complexes. Crystallographic investigations reveal that 1 has a centrosymmetric tetranuclear structure with a zig-zag Cd–Cu–Cu–Cd skeleton. The molecular structure of 2 consists of a pentanuclear centrosymmetric core in which four metal atoms are linked together by bridging oxygen atoms of L groups and bromide anions to form a parallelogram Cu–Cd–Cu–Cd centred on the fifth Cu. The hexanuclear complex 3 is made up of two symmetry-related units with triangular CuCd2 cores linked by amino alkoxo bridges, involving cadmium centres of both units.