Synthesis, structure, and reactivity of low-coordinate 1,1,3,3-tetraethylguanidinate complexes.

Diethylcyanamide is added to a hexanes solution of lithium diethylamide [LiN(CH(2)CH(3))(2)] resulting in the formation of lithium 1,1,3,3-tetraethylguanidinate, Li(mu-TEG) (1). Upon successful isolation of 1, the metathesis reaction of MX(2) (MX(2) = MnBr(2), FeBr(2), CoBr(2), and ZnCl(2)) with Li(mu-TEG) and lithium bistrimethylsilylamide, LiN(SiMe(3))(2), was performed to generate dinuclear tetraethylguanidinate (TEG) complexes with the general formula M(mu-TEG){N(SiMe(3))(2)} {M = Mn (2), Fe (3), Co (4), Zn (5)}. Further reaction of 2 with 2 equiv of ethanol (EtOH) and 2 equiv of 2,6-ditert-butylphenol (H-DBP) results in the formation of the manganese alkoxide, Mn(mu-OEt)(DBP)(H-TEG) (6). Elemental analysis, FT-IR spectroscopy, UV-vis spectroscopy, and single crystal X-ray diffraction were utilized to characterize the six compounds.