An Octanuclear Gold(I) Cube with Amidinate Ligands Containing Two Hyper-coordinate Ylide Carbon Atoms

Disparate properties of gold(I) converge to produce the first known cube assembly of eight Au(I) atoms connected by four N-bridging amidinate ligands on the sides of the cube, capped above and below by hyper-coordinate carbon atoms from a phosphorous ylide. There are no phosphines coordinated to the Au(I) atoms. The cluster is formulated as [Au-8{CH(NC8H9)(2)}(4){(eta(5)-C)P(C6H5)(2)(CH3)}(2)]. It displays a strong green luminescence under UV light. The novel product was generated in an attempt to produce luminescent species of gold(I) with mixed C- and N-coordination, an arrangement not abundant in the literature. The formation and structure of this cluster is reported.