Single-molecule magnet behavior in heterolopetic Dy³⁺-chloro-diazabutadiene complexes: influence of the nuclearity and ligand redox state

We report the synthesis, structure and magnetic properties investigations of a series of new dysprosium heteroleptic mono- and dinuclear complexes based on the association of chloride and different diazabutadiene (DAD2R = [2,6-iPr2C6H3N-CR[double bond, length as m-dash]CR-NC6H3iPr2-2,6]; R = H, Me) ligands showing different redox states. While using dianionic DAD2R ligands affords the formation of dichloro-bridged dinuclear complexes [Dy2(DAD2R)(μ-Cl)2(THF)2] (R = H (1), Me (2)), two different mononuclear complexes of general formula [DyCl2(DAD2R)(THF)2] (R = H (3), Me (4)) could be obtained with either a radical monoanionic and a monoanionic DAD2R state, respectively. Remarkably, all the complexes exhibit a slow relaxation of their magnetization where the relaxation dynamics depends on both the nuclearity of the system and the DAD2R redox state.