Structure and thermal stability of selected organic inclusion compounds

Abstract

Crystal engineering is the synthesis of new crystalline materials with specific chemical and physical properties which allows the comprehensive understanding of the non covalent interactions that occur between molecules in the crystalline state. This has lead to extensive work being done in terms of host design. The study of non-covalent interactions formed by - these materials is crucial to understanding many biological processes. This study focuses on the inclusion compounds of 1, 4-bis (diphenylhydroxymethyl) benzene H, a host compound engineered by EWeber, that conforms to Weber's rules for host design as it is bulky, rigid, and has hydroxyl moieties that act as hydrogen-bonding donors. A Cambridge Structural Database (CSDversion 5.33) search has revealed that no research has been conducted on this host compound. Characterization of the compounds were conducted using thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), hot stage microscopy (HS), gas chromatography (GC), powder X-ray diffraction(PXRD) and single X -ray diffraction. Host: guest ratios determined from TG analysis were correlated with structural analysis results. We have successfully prepared inclusion compounds with N, N- dimethylformamide(DMF) N, N- dimethylacetamide (DMA), N-methylformamide (NMF) and N-methylacetamide (NMA), 2-picoline, 3-picoline, 4-picoline, pyridine and morpholine. Following which a series of competition experiments were conducted to establish the selectivity profile of the host by dissolving the host in an excess of two guests pairs, between DMF: DMA, DMF: NMF, DMF: NMA, DMA: NMF, DMA: NMA and NMF: NMA. The results of the competition experiment showed that the host had high selectivity for DMF and the selectivity profile follows a trend as follows DMF>NMA>NMF>DMA. The results for the competition experiments between the picolines, pyridine and morpholine were inconclusive.