Sulfur Atoms as Ligands in Metal Complexes

Abstract

AbstractThe types of sulfur bonding—as sulfane or sulfide—encountered in the molecules of maingroup elements are almost unknown in the chemistry of metal complexes, where the sulfur atoms function instead as two‐electron donors by bridging two metal atoms, as four‐electron donors by bridging three or four metal atoms, or as six‐electron donors by incorporation between four metal atoms. In such complexes, the metal‐metal bond can be modified over a wide range by chemical or electrochemical variation of the number of electrons present. The readiness with which polynuclear complexes containing metals and sulfur undergo redox reactions is also utilized by Nature in the active sites of some redox proteins.