| Summary: | We report reversible structural transformation that occurs in two ladder compounds: Cu<sub>2</sub>CO<sub>3</sub>(ClO<sub>4</sub>)<sub>2</sub>(NH<sub>3</sub>)<sub>6</sub> (<b>1</b>) and Cu<sub>2</sub>CO<sub>3</sub>(ClO<sub>4</sub>)<sub>2</sub>(NH<sub>3</sub>)<sub>5</sub>(H<sub>2</sub>O) (<b>2</b>), when they are exposed to gaseous vapors. The ladder structures of both <b>1</b> and <b>2</b> consist of two Cu<sup>2+</sup> ions and one CO<sub>3</sub><sup>2−</sup> ion. In <b>1</b>, the Cu<sup>2+</sup> ions are coordinated by three NH<sub>3</sub> molecules on each side, while those in <b>2</b> are coordinated by three NH<sub>3</sub> molecules on one side, and two NH<sub>3</sub> molecules and one H<sub>2</sub>O molecule on the other side. We demonstrated reversible transformation of <b>1</b> and <b>2</b> via the exposure of <b>1</b> to H<sub>2</sub>O vapor and the exposure of <b>2</b> to NH<sub>3</sub> vapor using a simple bench-scale method. The minor structural change observed led to a significant difference in physical properties, which we observed using several methods.
|
|---|
