This award is made in the Inorganic, Bioinorganic and Organometallic Chemistry Prorgam in support of the research of Dr. Myron Rosenblum of Brandeis University. The objective of the research is the design, synthesis and property characterization of a new class of sterically constrained metallocenes held in a face-to-face orientation. Such materials are expected to have interesting electrical conductivity and possibly nonlinear optical properties. Triad molecules consisting of three such metallocene units either all identical (homonuclear) or different(heteronuclear) will be prepared. The synthesis of homonuclear polymers composed of chains of such face-to-face metallocenes will also be carried out as well as those in which two different metals alternate in the polymer chain. Synthesis of branched-chain polymers in which cyclopentadienylmetal clusters containing two, three or four cyclopentadienylmetal centers form repeating units within the polymer are planned. Analogous metallocene systems derived from 2,2'-bis(metallocenyl)-1,1-binaphthyls will be made and studied. These substances are capable of exhibiting electronic interactions either through the face-to-face conformation or through the binaphthyl rings, and are, in principle, preparable in optically active form. Collaborations are in place to characterize the electrical and magnetic properties of the polymers.
