Wheel-shaped icosanuclear homo- and heterometallic complexes of Ni(II), Co(II), and Cu(II) ions supported by unsymmetrical aminoalcohol ligands.

Reactions of M(OAc)2·4H2O (M = Ni, Co) with 3-[benzyl(2-hydroxyethyl)amino]-1-propanol (H2L) in the presence of pyridine or triethylamine afforded novel homometallic icosanuclear wheel-shaped complexes [M20L4(HL)4(OAc)28] (M = Ni (1), Co (2)), which consist of a central M(II)12 single-stranded, nearly planar loop with four peripheral [M2(HL)(OAc)2] fragments attached in an S4 symmetrical fashion. The complexes can alternatively be recognized as saddle-shaped wheel structures, in which four tetranuclear units of [M4L(HL)(OAc)7](2-) are connected by four M(2+) ions (M5). The tetranuclear unit itself can be derived from an ideal C2 symmetrical [M4(HL)2(μ-η(2)-OAc)4(μ-η(1),η(1)-OAc)2(η(1),η(1)-OAc)](-) structure through deprotonation of the HL(-) ligand, and is composed of two plane-shared M3O4 incomplete cubanes in which the M2 and M3 atoms are involved in the central fused plane and the M1 and M4 atoms are disposed at the apex sites.