Design of a structural database for homoleptic transition metal complexes

The borderless world of chemical bonding across the van der Waals crust and the valence region

The definition of the van der Waals crust as the spherical section between the atomic radius and the van der Waals radius of an element is discussed and a survey of the application of the penetration index between two interacting atoms in a wide variety of covalent, polar, coordinative or noncovalent bonding situations is presented. It is shown that this newly defined parameter permits the comparison of bonding between pairs of atoms in structural and computational studies independently of the atom sizes.

Further Perspectives on the Teflate versus Fluoride Analogy: The Case of a Co(II) Pentafluoroorthotellurate Complex

The pentafluoroorthotellurate group (teflate, OTeF5) is considered as a bulky analogue of fluoride, yet its coordination behavior in transition metal complexes is not fully understood. By reaction of [CoCl4]2- and neat ClOTeF5, we synthesized the first cobalt teflate complex, [Co(OTeF5)4]2-, which exhibits moisture-resistant Co-OTeF5 bonds. Through a combined experimental and theoretical (DFT and NEVPT2) study, the properties and electronic structure of this species have been investigated. It exhibits a distorted tetrahedral structure around the cobalt center and can be described as a d7 system with a quartet (S = 3/2) ground state. A comparative bonding analysis of the (pseudo)tetrahedral [CoX4]2- anions (X = OTeF5, F, Cl) revealed that the strength of the Co-X interaction is similar in the three cases, being the strongest in [Co(OTeF5)4]2-. In addition, an analysis of the charge of the Co center reinforced the similar electron-withdrawing properties of the teflate and fluoride ligands. Therefore, the [Co(OTeF5)4]2- anion constitutes an analogue of the polymeric [CoF4]2- in terms of electronic properties, but with a monomeric structure.