The importance of organoaluminum compounds is due to
their use in a variety of applications, including organic
syntheses and industrial catalytic processes. They have also
been utilized as precursors in chemical vapor deposition
(CVD) processes.1 It has been observed that stable aluminum
compounds involving nitrogen substituents or neutral nitrogen
donors are useful in the preparation of aluminum nitride
or AlN-containing materials. As a result, there is considerable
interest in the structures, properties, and transformations
of molecules containing Al-N bonds.2 Particularly,
there has been immense research interest in synthesizing
aluminum chlorides and methyl derivatives which can act
as precursors in the controlled hydrolysis with water or
reactive oxygen containing species which leads to the preparation
of alumoxanes.3
There are very few reports on structurally characterized
four-membered aluminum rings bearing halide, methyl, and
hydride substituents probably because of the steric and
electronic properties. The interest in these ligands is currently
growing as a result of their specific steric and electronic
features, and these properties can efficiently control the
geometry at the metal center. Herein we report the synthesis
and structural characterization of aluminum complexes with
chloride, hydride, methyl, amide, and diethyl substituents
based on an iminophosphonamide ligand.