The Golden Series and Clusters of Gold-unique Shapes and Bonding

Abstract

Golden clusters have been analyzed and categorized using the series method. They have been found to be intensely capped. The complexity of capping is likely responsible for the unique shapes of clusters. The predicted structures of the golden clusters with one or two nuclear indices have been found to be in agreement with the observations from structural determinations. According to the series, the golden clusters have tendency of occurring in an overlapping area which is normally dominated by naked metal clusters. The series approach method is easy and very reliable in analyzing and characterizing clusters. A brief background to the series method was included to ease readability of the paper.

The Outstanding Applications of Skeletal Numbers to Chemical Clusters

“…The 4n(14n) series method developed in this work, in which n represents the number of skeletal elements in a cluster, can be used to categorize a wide range of clusters, among others, transition metal carbonyls, boranes, heteroboranes, metalloboranes, Zintl ions, and gold clusters (Kiremire, 2015a(Kiremire, , 2015b(Kiremire, ,2016c(Kiremire, ,2016d(Kiremire, , 2017. Using the series formula, the number of valence electrons of a given cluster can easily be calculated directly without counting the valence electrons of individual skeletal atoms and ligands.…”

“…The use of skeletal numbers to categorize clusters has been done (Kiremire, 2017). This is yet another area where skeletal numbers are extremely useful.…”

“…Thus, for q = 0, we have a mono-capped cluster, C 1 , q = -2, C 2 , a bi-capped cluster, q = -4, C 3 , a tri-capped cluster, and so on. A Capping Symbol, Cp = C n C[M-x] where n is the number of skeletal atoms capping , x is the number of skeletal elements around which the capping takes place, and M stands for skeletal element, was introduced (Kiremire, 2015b(Kiremire, , 2015d(Kiremire, ,2017. It is quite clear that the number of capping elements correspond to the multiple of (-2) in the series.…”

“…A large number of transition metal carbonyl clusters, metalloboranes and golden clusters belong to the series S = 4n+q, where q≤ 0. This means that a good percentage of these clusters are highly capped (Kiremire, 2017). A series symbol for these was created, S = 4n+q as well as its corresponding K value given by K = 2n-½ q.…”

The Fascinating Symmetries of Golden Clusters Containing Two Skeletal Elements [M-2] in the Cluster Nucleus

“…It has been found that the series method is generally very precise in categorizing and predicting the shapes of clusters such as boranes and their relatives, carbonyl and Zintl clusters (Kiremire, 2016a). The categorization of some golden clusters has been done using skeletal numbers and some of the work published (Kiremire, 2016b(Kiremire, , 2016c(Kiremire, , 2017. In this paper the emphasis is to closely focus mainly on selected samples of capped golden clusters whose nuclei are comprised of two skeletal elements.…”