Switching from antiferromagnetic to ferromagnetic coupling in heptanuclear [M(t)6M(c)](n+) complexes by going from an achiral to a chiral triplesalen ligand.

The chiral triplesalen ligand H6chand(RR) has been used to synthesize the chiral heptanuclear complexes [{(chand(RR))Mn(III)3}2{Fe(II)(CN)6}](ClO4)2 ((RR)[Mn(III)6Fe(II)](ClO4)2) and [{(chand(RR))Fe(III)3}2{Fe(II)(CN)6}](ClO4)2 ((RR)[Fe(III)6Fe(II)](ClO4)2), which have been characterized by single-crystal X-ray diffraction, mass spectrometry, elemental analysis, FT-IR, Mössbauer, and UV-vis spectroscopies, electrochemistry, as well as DC and AC magnetic susceptibility measurements. The half-wave potential of the Fe(III)/Fe(II) couple in (RR)[Mn(III)6Fe(II)](2+) and (RR)[Fe(III)6Fe(II)](2+) is E1/2 = +0.21 and +0.75 V vs. Fc(+)/Fc, respectively, which (i) corresponds to a strong stabilization of the reduced Fe(II) species compared to the redox couple of free [Fe(II/III)(CN)6](4-/3-) and (ii) indicates a significant difference of the electronic coupling with the {(chand(RR))M(t)}(3+) units (M(t) = Mn(III), Fe(III)). Analysis of the DC magnetic data (μeffvs. T, VTVH) of both complexes by a full-matrix diagonalization of the spin-Hamiltonian including isotropic exchange, zero-field splitting with full consideration of the relative orientation of the D tensors and Zeeman interactions reveals ferromagnetic interactions of JMn-Mn = +0.17 ± 0.02 cm(-1) with DMn = -3.4 ± 0.3 cm(-1) for (RR)[Mn(III)6Fe(II)](2+) and JFe-Fe = +0.235 ± 0.005 cm(-1) with DFe = 0 for (RR)[Fe(III)6Fe(II)](2+). The comparison of the molecular structures of (RR)[Mn(III)6Fe(II)](2+) and (RR)[Fe(III)6Fe(II)](2+) with those of the heptanuclear complexes [M(t)6M(c)](n+) using the achiral triplesalen ligand (talen(t-Bu2))(6-) reveals significant differences in the ligand folding, smaller C-C bond distances in the central phloroglucinol ring and larger HOMA values. This indicates more aromatic character and less heteroradialene contribution in (RR)[Mn(III)6Fe(II)](2+) and (RR)[Fe(III)6Fe(II)](2+), which explains the switching from antiferromagnetic coupling in [M(t)6M(c)](n+) to ferromagnetic coupling in (RR)[M(t)6M(c)](n+) by a stronger contribution of the spin-polarization mechanism. This establishes a magnetostructural correlation between the structural parameters describing the aromaticity of the central phloroglucinol unit and the observed exchange couplings JMn-Mn.