Anion Templated Crystal Engineering of Halogen Bonding Tripodal Tris(halopyridinium) Compounds
<div>In this work four new tripodal tris(halopyridinium) receptors containing potentially halogen</div><div>bonding groups were prepared. The ability of the receptors to bind anions in competitive</div><div>CD<sub>3</sub>CN/d<sub>6</sub>-DMSO was studied using <sup>1</sup>H NMR titration experiments, which revealed that the</div><div>receptors bind chloride anions more strongly than more basic acetate or other halide ions.</div><div>The solid state self–assembly of the tripodal receptors with halide anions was investigated by</div><div>X-ray crystallography. The nature of the structures was dependent on the choice of halide</div><div>anion, as well as the crystallisation solvent. Halogen bond lengths as short as 80% of the sum</div><div>of the van der Waals radii were observed, which is shorter than any halogen bonds involving</div><div>halopyridinium receptors in the Cambridge Structural Database.</div>