Investigation of structural and dynamic properties of NH4[N(CN)2] by means of X-ray and neutron powder diffraction as well as vibrational and solid-state NMR spectroscopy

The crystal structure, spectroscopic and thermal properties of ammonium dicyanamide NH₄[N(CN)₂] have been thoroughly investigated by means of temperature-dependent single-crystal X-ray and neutron powder diffraction, vibrational and MAS-NMR spectroscopy as well as thermoanalytical measurements. The comprehensive elucidation of structural details is of special interest with respect to the unique solid-state transformation of ammonium dicyanamide into dicyandiamide. This reaction occurs at temperatures >80°C and it represents the isolobal analogue of Wöhler's historic transformation of ammonium cyanate into urea. NH₄[N(CN)₂] crystallizes in the monoclinic space group P2₁/c with lattice constants a=3.7913(8), b=12.412(2), c=9.113(2) Å, β=91.49(2)° and Z=4 (single-crystal X-ray data, T=200 K). The temperature dependence of the lattice constants shows anisotropic behavior, however, no evidence for phase transitions in the investigated temperature range was observed. The hydrogen positions could be localized by neutron diffraction (10-370 K), and the temperature-dependent behavior of the ammonium group has been analyzed by Rietveld refinements using anisotropic thermal displacement parameters. They were interpreted by utilizing a rigid body model and extracting the libration and translation matrices of the ammonium ion by applying the TLS formalism. The results obtained by the diffraction methods were confirmed and supplemented by vibrational spectroscopy and solid-state ¹⁵N and ¹³C MAS-NMR investigations.