An Alkali Metal-Capped Cerium(IV) Imido Complex

Structurally authenticated, terminal lanthanide-ligand multiple bonds are rare and expected to be highly reactive. Even capped with an alkali metal cation, poor orbital energy matching and overlap of metal and ligand valence orbitals should result in strong charge polarization within such bonds. We expand on a new strategy for isolating terminal lanthanide-ligand multiple bonds using cerium(IV) complexes. In the current case, our tailored tris(hydroxylaminato) ligand framework, TriNOx(3-), provides steric protection against ligand scrambling and metal complex oligomerization and electronic protection against reduction. This strategy culminates in isolation of the first formal Ce═N bonded moiety in the complex [K(DME)2][Ce═N(3,5-(CF3)2C6H3)(TriNOx)], whose Ce═N bond is the shortest known at 2.119(3) Å.