Four new families of polynuclear Zn-Ln coordination clusters. Synthetic, topological, magnetic and luminescent aspects

The employment of three structurally related Schiff bases H2L1, H2L2 , and H3L3 with zinc and lanthanide salts under various reaction conditions, gave four families of compounds formulated as [ZnII2LnIII2(L1)4(EtOH)6][ClO4]2 (1-3), [ZnII5Ln(OH)(L1)6(H2O)] (4-6), [(ZnII4LnIII2(OH)2(L2)4(OAc)2(NO3)2(DMF)3]) (7-9), [ZnII2LnIII2(L3)2(NO3)2(CO3)2(CH3OH)2] (10-12) with robust and novel topologies. Synthetic aspects are discussed. A comprehensive topological analysis of all reported ZnII/LnIII CCs with a core nuclearity of four and above is presented and identifies that families (4-6) and (7-9) are the first examples of the 2,3,4M6-1 motif in ZnII/LnIII chemistry. Magnetic studies are presented for the DyIII analogues (1, 7 and 10) are presented, 7 demonstrates field-induced slow relaxation of the magnetization. Fluorescence studies are also discussed.