ISSN 1070-3284, Russian Journal of Coordination Chemistry, 2007, Vol. 33, No. 10, pp. 779–787. © Pleiades Publishing, Ltd., 2007. 779 1 Transition metal complexes of diimine and related ligands have attracted much attention [1–4]. Running years have witnessed a great deal of interest in the syn- thesis of the complexes of gold with α-diimine-type of ligands because of their photochemical and catalytic properties [5], energy conversion, and the ability to serve as building blocks in supramolecular arrays [6]. Researchers have been engaged in modifying the prop- erties of Au–pyridine complexes by replacing the ligands of other donor centers, altering the steric and electronic properties of the ligands, differently substi- tuted polypyridine mixed donor heterocycles. The search for a suitable precursor to synthesize azoimine complexes is a challenging domain, and the compounds are found to be useful in this context [7]. The concept of “metallophilic bonding” has added a new range of intermolecular interactions to the spectrum of chemical bonding in supramolecular aggregates [8]. A small number of scattered observations in the early structural chemistry of gold(I) complexes [1–4, 7, 9, 10] has grown into a wealth of reports on related phenomena in the last two decades, which finally provided a clear pat- tern of the conditions under which direct interactions between closed-shell gold(I) centers can contribute sig- nificantly to the stability of molecular and multidimen- 1 The article was submitted by the authors in English. sional structures [9–11]. The underlying “aurophilic” bonding has been analyzed in theoretical studies, which have confirmed the experimental results and gave an explanation for the finding that the “metallophilic” bonding is strongest and, therefore, most obvious for heavy metals in general and for gold complexes in par- ticular [1–3]. Notwithstanding, there has also been growing evidence for weak metallophilic bonding between low-coordinate silver atoms [3] and, as a logi- cal consequence, for gold–silver metallophilicity [5, 6, 8, 12–15]. In this article we present new and noteworthy exam- ples taken from the important class of gold triphe- nylphosphines. Gold phosphine compounds have inter- esting photophysical properties [2] and are relevant to homogeneous gold catalysis [1] and gold/silver thin film technology [3]. Recently, we have developed the arylazoimidazole chemistry of ruthenium and have synthesized dichloro compounds [RuCl 2 (RAaiR') 2 ] and diaquo species [Ru(OH 2 ) 2 (RAaiR') 2 ] 2+ (RAaiR' = p-R– C 6 H 4 –N=N–C 3 H 2 –NN–1-R', R = H, Me, Cl and R' = Me, CH 2 CH 3 , CH 2 Ph abbreviated as N,N'-chelator, where N (imidazole) and N (azo) represent N and N', respectively). Syntheses of hetero-tris-chelates, [Ru(Bipy) n (RAaiR') 3 – n ](ClO 4 ) 2 (Bipy = 2.2'-bipyri- dine; n = 1, 2) from the solvento complexes [Ru(OH 2 ) 2 (Bipy) 2 ] 2+ /[Ru(OH 2 ) 2 (RAAIR'‘) 2 ] 2+ con- Gold(I)–Triphenylphosphine–Arylazoimidazole: Synthesis and Spectral (H, C, COSY, HMQC NMR) Characterization 1 P. Byabartta and M. Laguna Departmento de Quimica Inorganica-Instituto de Ciencia de Materiales de Aragon, Universidad de Zaragoza-CSIC, Zaragoza–50009, Spain E-mail: prithwis33@yahoo.com; Pribatta@rediffmail.com Received May 2, 2006 Abstract—The reaction of [Au(OSO 2 CF 3 )(PPh 3 )] with arylazoimidazole in dichloromethane followed by NH 4 PF 6 leads to [Au(RAaiR')(PPh 3 )]PF 6 (RAaiR' = p-R–N=N–C 3 H 2 –NN–1–R'), abbreviated as N,N'/-chela- tor, where N (imidazole) and N (azo) represent N and N', respectively; R = H (a), Me (b), Cl (c), and R' = Me (I), CH 2 CH 3 (II), CH 2 Ph (III)]. IR spectra of the complexes show –C=N– and –N=N-stretchings at 1590 and 1370 and at 1100, 755, 695, 545, and 505 cm –1 due to the presence of the triphenylphosphine ring. The 1 H NMR spectral measurements suggest that methylene (–CH 2 –) in (RAai)Et gives a complex of the AB type multiplet with a cou- pling constant of ~7.6 Hz while in RAaiCH 2 Ph it shows AB type quartets with coupling constant of av. 7.2 Hz. Considering the arylazoimidazole moity, there are different carbon atoms in the molecule giving different peaks in the 13 C NMR spectrum of the complexes. In the 1 H– 1 H COSY spectrum of the present complexes, the absence of any off-diagonal peaks extending from δ = 14.12 and 9.55 ppm confirms their assignment of no pro- ton on N(1) and N(3), respectively. Contour peaks in the 1 H– 13 C HMQC spectrum in the present complexes, the absence of any contours at δ = 157.12, 160.76, 155.67, and 157.68–160.2 ppm assign them to the C(2), C(6), C(12), and C(PPh 3 ) carbon atoms, respectively. The solution structure and stereoretentive transformation in each step have been established from the 1 H NMR results. DOI: 10.1134/S1070328407100120