Hexanuclear copper(II) complex of 2-hy-droxy-,'-bis-[1-(2-hy-droxy-phen-yl)ethyl-idene]propane-1,3-di-amine incorporating an open-cubane core.

The title mol-ecular structure, namely, di-aqua-tris-(μ-1,3-bis-{[1-(2-oxidophen-yl)ethyl-idene]amino}-propan-2-olato)-μ-hydroxido-dinitrato-hexa-copper(II) ethanol tris-olvate, [Cu(CHNO)(NO)(OH)(HO)]·3CHOH, corres-ponds to a non-symmetric hexa-nuclear copper complex. The complex exhibits one core in which three Cu metal centres are mutually inter-connected, two by two, three phenolato oxygen anions acting in a μ-mode. These three copper cations are inter-connected in a μ-mode by one hydroxyl group. An open-cube structure is generated in which each of the Cu cations of the three CuON units is connected by two μ-O anions from phenolate groups and one μ-O atom from a hy-droxy anion. Each of the three penta-coordinated Cu cations situated in the open-cube unit has a distorted NO square-pyramidal environment. Each of these three Cu centres is inter-connected with another Cu cation one enolate O atom in μ-mode, yielding one CuNO unit and two CuNO units. The penta-coordinated Cu atom has a distorted square-pyramidal environment while the two tetra-coordinated copper(II) cations are situated in a square-planar environment. A series of intra-molecular O-H⋯O hydrogen bonds are observed. In the crystal, the units are connected two by two by inter-molecular C-H⋯O and O-H⋯O hydrogen bonds, thus forming sheets parallel to the plane.