Fullerene C60 exhibiting a strong intermolecular interaction in a cocrystallite with C4 symmetrical cobalt tetrakis(di-tert-butylphenyl)porphyrin

A new cocrystallite is reported which contains C60 with the cobalt(II) complex 5,10,15,20-tetrakis[3,5-(di-tert-butyl)phenyl]porphyrin (tbp). The inter-molecular distance between C60 and the CoII(tbp) molecules in the cocrystallite CoII(tbp)·C60 is quite short, having a value of 2.61 A at room temperature for any covalent bonding arrangement. This is the first report of X-ray structural analysis at room temperature of metal porphyrin cocrystallites with fullerenes. The temperature dependence of the inter-molecular interaction between C60 and the CoII(tbp) molecules has been investigated by ESR spectroscopy. C4 symmetry of the C60 molecule has been observed in this cocrystallite which can be explained by the disorder of the fullerene molecules in the crystal packing, caused by the strong inter-molecular interaction with the C4 symmetrical molecule of CoII(tbp). This cocrystallite forms one of the most attractive packing arrangements for molecular 3-D design based on the fullerene C60.