A lanthanide salen “square prism” and a wrapped exo-lanthanide salen “double decker”

Abstract

An erbium(III) salen “square prism” and a supramolecular aggregate of exo-erbium(III) salen “double-decker” cations wrapped by an anionic cuprous cyanide network were prepared from N,N′-ethylene bis[4-(diethylamino)salicylideneimine. Both erbium(III) edifices show fine-structure near-infrared (NIR) luminescence under the excitation in the visible light area. Here we provide a novel and efficient method for stabilizing non-isolable lanthanide edifices in the solid state.