Iron(III) carboxylate/aminoalcohol coordination clusters with propeller-shaped Fe8 cores: approaching reasonable exchange energies.

A series of new octanuclear propeller-like aminoalcohol-supported Fe(III) oxocarboxylate coordination clusters, [Fe8O3(O2CCHMe2)9(tea)(teaH)3]·MeCN·2(H2O) (1), [Fe8O3(O2CCHMe2)6(N3)3(tea)(teaH)3] (2), [Fe8O3(O2CCMe3)6(N3)3(tea)(teaH)3]·0.5(EtOH) (3), and [Fe8O3(O2CCHMe2)6(N3)3(mdea)3(MeO)3] (4) (where teaH3 = triethanolamine; mdeaH2 = N-methyldiethanolamine) has been isolated and magnetochemically analyzed combining the programs wxJFinder and CONDON in an approach to avoid overparameterization issues that are common to larger spin polytopes. Dominant antiferromagnetic exchange interactions exist in all clusters along the edges of the propellers, while moderate ferromagnetic interactions are found along the propeller axes in their {Fe8O3} metallic cores.