Cocrystallites consisting of metal macrocycles with fullerenes

Abstract The cocrystallites that contain C 60 , C 70 and endohedral metallofullerenes with metal complexes of macrocycles are reviewed. Metal complexes of porphyrin cocrystallites with fullerenes form solids with remarkably close contact between the curved π surface of a fullerene and the planar π surface of a porphyrin, without the need for matching convex with concave surfaces. The structures of metal octaethylporphyrins (oeps) in C 60 ·Pd(II)(oep)·1.5C 6 H 6 , C 60 ·Cu(II)(oep)·2C 6 H 6 , C 60 ·Ag(II)(oep)·2C 6 H 6 and C 60 ·2Ni(II)(oep)·2C 6 H 5 Cl reveal the remarkable anti -formed oep configurations, with the four ethyl groups of the metal oep portions lying on both the same and the opposite sides of the porphyrin plane toward the C 60 . On the other hand, syn -formed metal oeps are observed in the many cases of metal oep compounds, suggesting that there is a face-to-face interaction between two adjacent oep planes. A new cocrystallite which exhibits a strong intermolecular interaction between fullerene C 60 and the Co(tbp) is also reviewed, where tbp denotes a dianion of tetra(bis- tert -butylphenyl)porphyrin. The intermolecular interactions of the anti - and syn -formed metal oeps in the cocrystallites containing fullerenes are also described by DV-Xα molecular orbital calculation.