Self-assembly and SMM properties of lanthanide cyanocobaltate chain complexes with terpyridine as blocking ligand

Abstract A series of novel isomorphic 1D-polymeric complexes {[Ln(terpy)(H 2 O) 3 ][Co(CN) 6 ]·5H 2 O} n (Ln =  Tb , Dy , Er , Yb ; terpy is 2,2';6',2“-terpyridine) was prepared and characterized. Compounds Dy , Er and Yb were found to exhibit properties of field-induced single-molecule magnets with the anisotropy barriers of 68 K, 8 K and 37 K, respectively. Erbium complex Er seems to represent the first known example of Er-based cyanide-bridged 3d - 4f SMM, whereas Yb is the second Yb-based one. The effect of the geometry of the coordination environment as well as of ligands field symmetry on SMM behavior of Dy , Er and Yb compounds is discussed. Among the cyanocobaltate-bridged chain complexes, the Dy , Er , Yb are the first series formed by the entire set of heavy Kramers ions which were studied as SMMs.