New triple-decker complexes with bridging tetramethylcyclopentadienyl ligands were synthesized by the reaction of electrophilic metal fragments with octamethylferrocene, Cp′2Fe (Cp′ = C5Me4H). The reaction of coordinatively unsaturated ruthenium cations [(C5R5)Ru]+ (R = H, CH3) with Cp′2Fe afforded purple-colored heterometallic triple-decker complexes [(C5R5)Ru(μ-Cp′)FeCp′]+ by direct electrophilic addition. Surprisingly, the analogous reaction with the coordinatively unsaturated manganese cation [Mn(CO)3]+ and Cp′2Fe produced a blue homometallic triple-decker complex, [Cp′Fe(μ-Cp′)FeCp′]+, by ring abstraction and subsequent addition of the newly generated cation [Cp′Fe]+ to an equivalent of Cp′2Fe. Three air-stable triple-decker complexes, [Cp′Fe(μ-Cp′)FeCp′]+ (2), [CpRu(μ-Cp′)FeCp′]+ (3), and [Cp*Ru(μ-Cp′)FeCp′]+ (4), have been characterized by NMR spectroscopy, elemental analysis, and single-crystal X-ray diffraction.

The synthesis of phosphine macrocycles is a relatively underdeveloped area and no standard synthetic routes have emerged. Accordingly, two general synthetic routes to tetradentate phosphine macrocycles were investigated. Both routes use Cu(i) ions as template ions because, unlike other metals such as Pd(ii) and Pt(ii), the Cu(i) ions can be removed from the macrocyclic complex without degrading the macrocycle ligand. The first route involves the coupling of two bidentate secondary phosphines bonded to Cu(i) using 1,3-dibromopropane or 1,4-dibromobutane. Using this route, tetradentate phosphine macrocycles with either -(CH2)3OCH3 or Ph groups bonded to the P atoms were synthesized. Macrocycle phosphines containing the -(CH2)3OCH3 groups were investigated for their potential water-solubility, but experiments showed these phosphines were not water soluble. The second synthetic route involved the alkylation of an open-chain, mixed tertiary-secondary, tetradentate phosphine coordinated to Cu(i). Following formation of the macrocyclic ligand, the Cu(i) template was removed by reaction with aqueous KCN to yield the free macrocyclic phosphine. This route was demonstrated for the preparation of the macrocyclic phosphine ligand 1,5,9,13-tetraphenyl-1,5,9,13-tetraphosphacycloheptadecane. Following demetallation, this macrocyclic ligand was coordinated to Fe(ii) and Co(ii) to form the corresponding macrocyclic phosphine complexes.

is a free, open-source, user-friendly, and documented Julia package for modifying crystal structure models of porous materials such as metal–organic frameworks (MOFs). functions as a find-and-replace algorithm on crystal structures by leveraging (i) Ullmann’s algorithm to search for subgraphs of the crystal structure graph that are isomorphic to the graph of a query fragment and (ii) the orthogonal Procrustes algorithm to align a replacement fragment with a targeted substructure of the crystal structure for installation. The prominent application of is to generate libraries of hypothetical structures for virtual screenings. For example, one can install functional groups on the linkers of a parent MOF, mimicking postsynthetic modification. Other applications of to modify crystal structure models include introducing defects with precision and correcting artifacts of X-ray structure determination (adding missing hydrogen atoms, resolving disorder, and removing guest molecules). The find-and-replace operations implemented by can be applied broadly to diverse atomistic systems for various in silico structural modification tasks.