Structural trends in a series of isostructural lanthanide-copper metallacrown sulfates (Ln(III) = Pr, Nd, Sm, Eu, Gd, Dy and Ho): hexaaquapentakis[μ3-glycinehydroxamato(2-)]sulfatopentacopper(II)lanthanide(III) heptaaquapentakis[μ3-glycinehydroxamato(2-)]sulfatopentacopper(II)lanthanide(III) sulfate hexahydrate.

The seven isostructural complexes, [Cu(5)Ln(C(2)H(4)N(2)O(2))(5)(SO(4))(H(2)O)(6.5)](2)(SO(4))·6H(2)O, where Ln(III) = Pr, Nd, Sm, Eu, Gd, Dy and Ho, are representatives of the 15-metallacrown-5 family. Each dianion of glycinehydroxamic acid (GlyHA) links two Cu(II) cations forming a cyclic [CuGlyHA](5) frame. The Ln(III) cations are located at the centre of the [CuGlyHA](5) rings and are bound by the five hydroxamate O atoms in the equatorial plane. Five water molecules are coordinated to Cu(II) cations, and one further water molecule, located close to an inversion centre between two adjacent [Cu(5)Ln(GlyHA)(5)](2+) cations, is disordered around this inversion centre and coordinated to a Cu(II) cation of either the first or second metallacrown ether. Another water molecule and one of the two crystallographically independent sulfate anions are coordinated, the latter in a bidentate fashion, to the Ln(III) cation in the axial positions. The second sulfate anion is not coordinated to the cation, but is located in an interstitial position on a crystallographic inversion centre, thus leading to disorder of the O atoms around the centre of inversion. The Ln-O bond distances follow the trend of the lanthanide contraction. The apical Ln-O bond distances are very close to the sums of the ionic radii. However, the Ln-O distances within the metallacrown units are slightly compressed and the Ln(III) cations protrude significantly from the plane of the otherwise flat metallacrown ligand, thus indicating that the cavity is somewhat too small to accommodate the Ln(III) ions comfortably. This effect decreases with the size of the lanthanide cation from complex (I) (Ln(III) = Pr; 0.459) to complex (VII) (Ln(III) = Ho; 0.422), which indicates that the smaller lanthanide cations fit the cavity of the pentacopper metallacrown ring better than the larger ones. The diminished contraction of Ln-O distances within the metallacrown planes leads to an aniostropic contraction of the unit-cell parameters, with a, c and V following the trend of the lanthanide contraction. The b axes, which are mostly aligned with the rigid planes of the metallacrown units, show only a little variation between the seven compounds.