Mixed anion (phosphate/oxalate) bonding to iron(III) materials.

A novel phosphate/oxalate inorganic-organic hybrid material has been prepared to elucidate synthesis and bonding characteristics of iron(III) with both phosphate and organic matter (OM). Such mixed anion bonding of inorganic oxyanions and OM to iron(III) and aluminum(III) in environmental systems has been proposed but not proven, mainly because of the complexity of natural geochemical matrices. The compound reported here with the molecular formula of C(3)H(12)N(2)[Fe(5)(C(2)O(4))(2)(H(x)PO(4))(8)] (I) was hydrothermally synthesized and characterized by single crystal X-ray diffraction and X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS). In this new structure, Fe-O octahedra and P-O tetrahedra are connected by corner-sharing to form a 2-D network in the a-b plane. Oxalate anions cross-link these Fe-P layers constructing a 3-D anionic framework. A diprotonated structure-directing template, DAP (1,3-diaminopropane), resides in the oxalate layer of the structure and offsets the negative charge of the anionic framework. Iron K-edge XANES spectra confirmed that the iron in I is Fe(III). The crystal structure of I is used to successfully fit its Fe K-edge EXAFS spectrum, which exhibits spectral signatures that unambiguously identify iron-phosphate and iron-OM bonding. Such molecular spectroscopic features will be invaluable for the evaluation of complex environmental systems. Furthermore, syntheses demonstrated the critical role of the templating amine to mediate whether or not the iron(III) is reduced by the organic acid.