Syntheses and studies of flexible amide ligands: a toolkit for studying metallo-supramolecular assemblies for anion binding

The syntheses of seven flexible bidentate bis-pyridyl diamide and four monodentate pyridyl amide ligands containing central amide units are described. The bis-pyridyl ligands were prepared in one step from commercially available compounds in moderate to good yield. These compounds all possess external metal coordinating pyridyl groups and internal amide functionalities, with the potential to bind anions. Crystal structures of six of the bis-pyridyl diamide ligands are described. The four compounds with xylene cores N,N′-1,3-phenylenebis(methylene)]bis-3-pyridinecarboxamide 1, N,N′-1,3-phenylenebis(methylene)]bis-4-pyridinecarboxamide 2, N,N′-1,4-phenylenebis(methylene)]bis-3-pyridinecarboxamide 3 and N,N′-1,4-phenylenebis(methylene)]bis-4-pyridinecarboxamide 4 crystallize with extensive amide N-H?OC hydrogen bonding between the diamide compounds, giving rise to two and three dimensional hydrogen bonded networks. N,N′-Bis(3-pyridylmethyl)benzene-1,3-dicarboxamide 5, the only compound with the amide groups directly attached to a central benzene core, was not able to be crystallised. N,N′-2,6-Bis(3-pyridylmethyl)pyridine dicarboxamide 6 and N,N′-2,6-bis(4-pyridylmethyl)pyridine dicarboxamide 7 have a mismatch of hydrogen bond donor and acceptor regions preventing ready involvement of the amide NH groups in network formation. For comparison we also prepared compounds N,N′-2′-propyl-6-(3-pyridylmethyl)pyridine dicarboxamide 10 and N,N′-2′-propyl-6-(4-pyridylmethyl)pyridine dicarboxamide 11 with two amide groups but only the one external donor pyridyl moiety, and compounds N-6-(3-pyridylmethylamino)carbonyl]-2-pyridinecarboxylic acid methyl ester 8 and N-6-(4-pyridylmethylamino)carbonyl]-2-pyridinecarboxylic acid methyl ester 9, which have only the one amide.