The bi- and trinuclear iron(III) complexes [1,3-{Cp*(dppe)Fe(C
C-)}
2(C
6H
4)][PF
6]
2 (
22+)and [1,3,5-{Cp*(dppe)Fe(C
C-)}
3(C
6H
3)] [PF
6] (
33+) were prepared by oxidation of [1,3-{Cp*(dppe)Fe(C
C-)}
2(C
6H
4)] or [1,3,5-{Cp*(dppe)Fe(C
C-)}
3(C
6H
3)] with 2 or 3 equiv of[(C
5H
5)
2Fe][PF
6], respectively. Complexes
22+ and
33+ were isolated as thermally and air
stable blue microcry
stalline solids in 95 and 80% yield, respectively. These paramagneticcompounds were characterized by cyclic voltammetry, IR, UV-vis,
1H NMR, M&
ouml;ssbauer,and ESR spectroscopies. The three organoiron groups of
33+ are not located on the sameside of the molecule, and its two faces are therefore magnetically nonequivalent. The
1HNMR isotropic shifts are expected to be essentially contact shifts and the zfs (zero fieldsplitting) parameter
D is expected to be small for
22+ and
33+ since the Curie law is accuratelyobeyed for the proton resonances of the
-bound Cp* ligand. ESR spectra of the bi- andtriradicals showed broad and unresolved signals at
g = 2.10 (
22+,
Hpp = 550 G) and 2.13(
33+,
Hpp = 170 G) in addition to signals at
g = 4.55 and 4.46, respectively due to
ms =2 transition. The
ms = 3 transition was observed at
g = 7.97 in the spectrum of
33+. Thetemperature dependence of molar susceptibility obtained by SQUID measurements onmicrocry
stalline samples sugge
sted that the ferromagnetic interaction produces a tripletground
state in biradical
22+ (2
J = 130.6 ± 0.2 cm
-1) and a quartet ground
state for triradical
33+. The two doublet
states lie above the quartet by 18.7 ± 0.2 and 28.8 ± 0.2 cm
-1. Theseresults con
stitute the fir
st examples of magnetic exchange interactions in a three-spinorganometallic sy
stem with a triangular topology and the ferromagnetic coupling occurs atnanoscale di
stances between the metal spin carriers. The geometries of
22+ and
33+ wereoptimized using DFT calculations. High spin species were computed to be energeticallyfavored with the spin density mainly localized on the iron centers supporting the experimentalresults.