Self-Assembly of Ligand-Bridged Molecular Rectangles Containing fac-Re(CO)(3) Corners.

A series of molecular rectangles have been synthesized by self-assembly using Re(CO)5OTf, 4,4‘-bipyridine and an alcohol or water. The rectangles have been characterized by elemental analysis as well as IR, 1H NMR and UV−visible spectroscopies, and in one case cyclic voltammetry and an X-ray structure determination. These complexes are representatives of a new structural class of molecular parallelograms containing the unusual combination of carbon monoxide and alkoxide ligands around a Re(I) center.