Lithium furyl and pyridyl amidinates as building blocks in coordination polymers, ladder and cage structures.

Lithium N,N'-bis(trimethylsilyl)heterocyclic amidinate complexes with 3- and 4-pyridyl and 3-furyl carbon substituents were prepared by addition of the corresponding nitriles to LiN(SiMe(3))(2) (LiNTMS(2)) solution. In the presence of N,N,N',N' tetramethylethylene diamine (TMEDA), both pyridyl amidinates crystallize as coordination polymers with an amidinate-Li-pyridyl backbone. The 4-pyridyl derivative (7) creates a linear polymer with amidinate-Li-TMEDA units as side chains, whereas the 3-pyridyl polymer (6) has a two-dimensional (2D) network structure in which TMEDA serves as a cross-linker.