High-spin wheel of a heptanuclear mixed-valent Fe^II,III complex

Wheels with high spins: The reaction of a tridentate Schiff base ligand with iron (II) chloride, and subsequent oxidation with [(tBu₄N) MnO₄] yielded a heptanuclear mixed-valent iron wheel (see picture) with a spin ground state of S = 29/2. Cornering the 13th vertex: The first 13-vertex carborane (see picture, B: brown, C: gray, H: white) has been prepared by a methodology that can in principle be applied repeatedly, leading to 14-, 15-, 16-, ... vertex carboranes in the future. The 13-vertex species has a henicosahedral geometry, not the docosahedral one expected, but the two forms are found to be very close in energy by DFT calculations.