Exploring the Performance Improvement of Magnetocaloric Effect Based Gd-Exclusive Cluster Gd.

Despite wide potential applications of Gd-clusters in magnetocaloric effect (MCE) owing to f electron configuration of Gd(III), the structural improvement in order to enhance MCE remains difficult. A new approach of the situ hydrolysis of acetonitrile is reported, and the slow release of small ligand CHCOO is realized in the design and synthesis of high-nuclearity lanthanide clusters. A large lanthanide-exclusive cluster complex, [Gd(CO)(CHCOO)(μ-OH)(μ-OH)(HO)](NO3)Br(dmp)·30CHOH·20Hdmp (1-Gd), was isolated under solvothermal conditions. To the best our knowledge, cluster 1 possesses the high metal/ligand ratio (magnetic density) and the largest magnetic entropy change (- Δ S = 48.0 J kg K at 2 K for Δ H = 7 T) among previously reported high-nuclearity lanthanide clusters.