We have designed and synthesized a family of
dinuclear cyanido-bridged complexes [PY5Me
2Ru(μ-CN)Ru(dppe)CpMe
n][PF
6]
2 (PY5Me
2 = 2,6-bis (1,1-bis (2-pyridyl)ethyl) pyridine, Cp
= cyclopentadienyl, n = 0,
2[PF6]
2; n = 1,
3[PF6]
2;
n = 5,
4[PF6]
2) by using a mononuclear complex
[PY5Me
2Ru(
μ-CN)][PF
6]
(
1) as the precursor. All the three complexes have been fully
characterized by including single-crystal X-ray diffraction analysis. The one-electron oxidation complexes
23+,
33+ and
43+ obtained in situ all show a MMCT
absorption band in the visible range. The MMCT energy increases as the redox
potential of the N-terminal fragments decreases, and the redox potential
decreases as the number of methyl groups on the cyclopentadiene of the cyanido-nitrogen
coordinated Ru metal increases, supported by the TDF/TDDFT calculations.