Tin-Arsenic Heterocubane Synthesized

Cubane is a cube-shaped hydrocarbon. As with many other organic compounds, making cubane analogues with heavier elements is difficult. Alexander Hinz and Jose M. Goicoechea, University of Oxford, UK, have synthesized a hetero-cubane of the type [RSnAs]4 (pictured, R = 2,6-dimesitylphenyl). The team combined a 2,6-dimesitylphenyl-substituted chlorostannylene and salts of the heavy cyanate analogue AsCO– at room temperature in toluene to give the hetero-cubane. The compound is the first cubane containing SnIV in which the organic substituents are located on the tin atoms. The team characterized [RSnAs]4 using 119Sn NMR spectroscopy and X-ray crystallography.