Crystal structures and Hirshfeld surface analysis calculations of mercury(II) complexes with a diiminopyridine ligand

• Coordination behavior of a diiminopyridine ligand with mercury(II) ions have been investigated.
• The hydrogen–chlorine donor–accepter interactions stabilize an infinite 1-D chain.
• Shape index and dnorm-mapped HS are visualized and analyzed.

The reaction of a diiminopyridine ligand, N,N′-bis(phenyl(pyridin-2-yl)methylene)propane-1,3-diamine (L), with mercury(II) salts gave two complexes namely [Hg(L)Cl]·0.5[Hg2Cl6] (1) and [Hg(L)(μ-I)HgI3] (2), which were characterized by XRD, NMR and FTIR. The crystal structure of 1 consists of discrete units of [Hg(L)CI]+cations and [Hg2C16]2- anions in the ratio 2:1. The coordination of mercury in the cation is approximately square pyramidal (sp), the metal center is chelated in a tetradentate manner by the ligand and further coordinated by one chlorine atom. In 2 the packing can be described as units of μ-I-connected square pyramidal (sp) and tetrahedral Hg complexes. The sp coordination around the metal atom is defined by the N4 donor set of the ligand and one bridging iodide. The hydrogen–chlorine donor–accepter interactions in 1 stabilize an infinite 1-D chain; however, such interactions were not observed in 2. Analysis of their Hirshfeld surfaces indicates that the molecules in 1 and 2 are packed predominately by means of van der Waals forces, ‘edge to face’ aromatic ring packing and weak C–H··X donor-acceptor interactions.