Structural Conversion of Supramolecular Assembly in Solution via Thermally Induced Intramolecular Electron Transfer of [Co2Fe2] Complex.

Combining metal complexes with amphiphilic molecules leads to the construction of a wide variety of functional self-assembled nanostructures. Metal complexes exhibiting spin transitions can be good candidates as the trigger to cause structural conversion of such assembly because they respond to various external stimuli. In this work, we studied a structural conversion of supramolecular assembly composed of a [Co2Fe2] complex via a thermally induced electron transfer-coupled spin transition (ETCST). The [Co2Fe2] complex with an amphiphilic anion formed reverse vesicles in solution and showed the thermal ETCST. On the other hand, the thermal ETCST in the presence of a bridging hydrogen-bond donor (HBD) caused structural conversion from the reverse vesicle structure to entangled onedimensional (1D) chains through hydrogen-bond (HB) formations.