'Inverse' Coordination: A New Design Concept in Supramolecular Inorganic Chemistry

While organic hosts for the coordination of anions have been extensively studied in the past few decades, studies of inorganic counterparts (whose frameworks are based predominantly on non-carbon atoms) have been much rarer. Indeed, the potentially general usefulness of inorganic systems of this type in anion coordination and supramolecular chemistry has not been realised, despite the fact that inorganic hosts frequently offer far greater affinity for anions than organic relatives (particularly those containing Lewis acidic metal atoms). In establishing a new collaboration, this proposal seeks to harness the expertise of two of the UK's leading researchers in main group chemistry in the development and exploitation of the new synthetic concept of inverse coordination of salt lattices, in which a range of elegant metal-based acceptors will be used as anion hosts. A major area of interest is the rational design of supramolecular main group assemblies using the concept of inverse coordination. In addition to providing the means for the stabilisation of unusual inorganic and organometallic anions, the immobilisation of the anions of simple salts by metal-based inverse ligands provides a novel approach to fast-ion conductors.