Syntheses, structures and photoluminescence properties of a series of metal–organic complexes with 1,3-benzenedicarboxylate and 10,11,12,13-tetrahydro-4,5,9,14-tetraaza-benzo[b]triphenylene ligands

Three unusual compounds that a one-dimensional (1-D) chain and two two-dimensional (2-D) sheets are synthesized by the combination of three different metallic salts and organic ligands that 10,11,12,13-tetrahydro-4,5,9,14-tetraaza-benzo[b]triphenylene (TTBT) and 1,3-benzenedicarboxylic acid (1,3-H2BDC), viz. [Cd(TTBT)(1,3-BDC)]n (1), [Mn2(TTBT)2(1,3-BDC)2]n (2) and [Zn2(TTBT)2(1,3-BDC)2]n · 2nH2O (3), characterized by elemental analyses, thermal gravimetry (TG), fluorescent emission and single crystal X-ray diffraction analyses. 1 has a square-wave-like 1-D chain structure, which further assembled into a 2-D layer through an interchain π–π interaction with approximate elliptical channels along c axis. 2 and 3 possess similar 2-D sheet structures; in particular the adjacent sheets are further interlinked by intersheet π–π stacking interaction to form three-dimensional (3-D) supramolecular network. All compounds have extended solid-state structure formed by π–π interactions, and there is an excellent opportunity to elucidate the difference in the formation of extended networks in these three compounds. Furthermore, solid-state luminescent spectra of the complexes 1 and 3 indicate intense green fluorescent emission.