Crystal structure and Hirshfeld surface analysis of 2-(4-nitro-phen-yl)-2-oxoethyl picolinate.

2-(4-Nitro-phen-yl)-2-oxoethyl picolinate, CHNO, was synthesized under mild conditions. The chemical and mol-ecular structures were confirmed by single-crystal X-ray diffraction analysis. The mol-ecules are linked by inversion into centrosymmetric dimers weak inter-molecular C-H⋯O inter-actions, forming (10) ring motifs, and further strengthened by weak π-π inter-actions. Hirshfeld surface analyses, the surfaces, electrostatic potential and two-dimensional fingerprint (FP) plots were used to verify the contributions of the different inter-molecular inter-actions within the supra-molecular structure. The shape-index surface shows that two sides of the mol-ecules are involved with the same contacts in neighbouring mol-ecules and curvedness plots show flat surface patches that are characteristic of planar stacking.