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Open Access Published by De Gruyter (O) July 1, 2013

Metal-ligand bond lengths and strengths: are they correlated? A detailed CSD analysis

  • Anders Nimmermark , Lars Öhrström and Jan Reedijk

Abstract

Structure data on metal-alkoxides, metal-alcohol, metal-carboxylates, metal-carboxylic acid, metal-azolate and metal-azole coordination compounds from the Cambridge Structural Database (CSD) were analysed in terms of bond lengths. In general the anionic ligands form shorter metal-ligand bonds by about 0.02–0.05 Å compared to neutral ligands, a clear indication of a charge contribution to the bonding interactions. This small difference is not, however, deemed as sufficient to generate two distinct classes of metal-ligand bonding. Instead, the anionic ligands can be viewed as having “charge assisted” metal-ligand bonding, corresponding to the same term used for “charge-assisted hydrogen bonding”.


* Correspondence address: Chalmers University of Technology, Dept. of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Physical Chemistry, 41296 Göteborg, Schweden,

Published Online: 2013-07
Published in Print: 2013-07

© by Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag, München, Germany

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