Coordination Assembled Rings of Ferrocene-Bridged Trisporphyrin with Flexible Hinge-like Motion:  Selective Dimer Ring Formation, Its Transformation to Larger Rings, and Vice Versa

Ferrocene-bridged trisporphyrin (2) was synthesized by two-steps condensation of corresponding aldehydes and dipyrromethanes, and its self-assembling behavior based on the complementary coordination motif of imidazolylporphyrinatozinc(II) was investigated in conjunction with hinge-like flexibility given by freely rotating cyclopentadienyl rings of ferrocene connector. Ferrocene-bridged trisporphyrin (2) spontaneously and exclusively generated the dimeric ring (7) upon simple zinc(II) insertion, indicating that the freely rotating hinge connector favored the smallest ring formation. Taking advantage of the unique hinge-like flexibility of ferrocene, we attempted to transform the dimer ring into a mixture of porphyrin macrocycles by reorganizing the structure cleaved once by pyridine. A series of porphyrin macrocycles from trimer to decamer can be separated into its components by preparative gel permeation chromatograms. Macrocycles obtained are kept stable in the absence of coordinating solvents. On the other hand, they were easily transformed to the dimer ring in the presence of coordinating solvents such as methanol, showing that the transformation is completely reversible and can be controlled by the choice of the solvent system. A series of porphyrin macrocycles was confirmed via covalent linking of each complementary coordination dimer pair by metathesis reaction in the presence of Grubbs's catalyst. The coordination behavior of the bidentate ligands with different spacer lengths toward the dimer ring revealed that only the bidentate ligand (15) with a spacer length that matched the facing central porphyrins was selectively accommodated inside the ring. Coordination assembled flexible rings with tunable cavities and multiple coordination sites will be used as versatile hosts for a wide variety of guest molecules.