Defying the inverse energy gap law: a vacuum-evaporable Fe(ii) low-spin complex with a long-lived LIESST state

Design and Processing as Ultrathin Films of a Sublimable Iron(II) Spin Crossover Material Exhibiting Efficient and Fast Light-Induced Spin Transition

Materials based on spin crossover (SCO) molecules have centered the attention in molecular magnetism for more than 40 years as they provide unique examples of multifunctional and stimuli-responsive materials, which can be then integrated into electronic devices to exploit their molecular bistability. This process often requires the preparation of thermally stable SCO molecules that can sublime and remain intact in contact with surfaces. However, the number of robust sublimable SCO molecules is still very scarce. Here, we report a novel example of this kind. It is based on a neutral iron(II) coordination complex formulated as [Fe(neoim)2], where neoimH is the ionogenic ligand 2-(1H-imidazol-2-yl)-9-methyl-1,10-phenanthroline. In the first part, a comprehensive study, which covers the synthesis and magnetostructural characterization of the [Fe(neoim)2] complex as a bulk microcrystalline material, is reported. Then, in the second part, we investigate the suitability of this material to form thin films through high-vacuum sublimation. Finally, the retainment of all present SCO capabilities in the bulk when the material is processed is thoroughly studied by means of X-ray absorption spectroscopy. In particular, a very efficient and fast light-induced spin transition (LIESST effect) has been observed, even for ultrathin films of 15 nm.

Crystal structure of bis-{3-(3,4-di-meth-oxy-phen-yl)-5-[6-(pyrazol-1-yl)pyridin-2-yl]-1,2,4-triazol-3-ato}iron(II)-methanol-chloro-form (1/2/2)

The unit cell of the title compound, [Fe(C18H15N6O2)2]·2CH3OH·2CHCl3, consists of a charge-neutral complex mol-ecule, two methanol and two chloro-form mol-ecules. In the complex, the two tridentate 2-(5-(3,4-di-meth-oxy-phen-yl)-1,2,4-triazol-3-yl)-6-(pyrazol-1-yl)pyridine ligands coordinate to the central FeII ion through the N atoms of the pyrazole, pyridine and triazole groups, forming a pseudo-octa-hedral coordination sphere. Neighbouring tapered mol-ecules are linked through weak C-H(pz)⋯π(ph) inter-actions into one-dimensional chains, which are joined into two-dimensional layers through weak C-H⋯N/C/O inter-actions. Furthermore, the layers stack in a three-dimensional network linked by weak inter-layer C-H⋯π inter-actions of the meth-oxy and phenyl groups. The inter-molecular contacts were qu-anti-fied using Hirshfeld surface analysis and two-dimensional fingerprint plots, revealing the relative contributions of the contacts to the crystal packing to be H⋯H 32.0%, H⋯C/C⋯H 26.3%, H⋯N/N⋯H 13.8%, and H⋯O/O⋯H 7.5%. The average Fe-N bond distance is 2.185 Å, indicating the high-spin state of the FeII ion. Energy framework analysis at the HF/3-21 G theory level was performed to qu-antify the inter-action energies in the crystal structure.