Professorial Fellow CONTACT DETAILS:
Address: School of
Chemistry, University of Melbourne, 3010 Australia
Room: 508
Email: r.robson@unimelb.edu.au
Research areas of interest
Crystal Engineering of Novel Materials Composed of Infinite 2D and 3D Frameworks This project involves the design, synthesis and crystallographic study of a new class of infinite molecular lattices constructed from rod-like or plate-like building blocks linked together in a variety of ways to generate 2D and 3D framework structures. In some cases these generate channels and cavities of large dimensions;[1] in other cases independent infinite frameworks interpenetrate each other in various ways [2] and in yet other cases exceptionally large but completely sealed-off chambers are formed [3]. An unprecedented mode of interpenetration discovered was of the polyrotaxane type. [4] We have been focussing recently upon putting the potent chelate effect to use in connecting ligands that bind three or more metal centres, each at a chelate site. The ligand in the figure below binds three metal centres at phenanthroline-like chelating sites to generate a microporous infinite 3D network with the highly symmetrical (10,3)-a topoly. [5] These crystals retain their single crystal character after undergoing exchange of solvent in the micropores - testament to the effectiveness of the chelating tactic for reinforcing networks.
Selected Publications:
- Abrahams BF, Hoskins BF, Michail DM, Robson R,
Nature, 1994, 369, 727.
- Abrahams BF, Batten SR, Hamit
H, Hoskins BF, Robson R, Chem. Commun., 1996, 1313.
- Batten
SR, Hoskins BF, Robson R, J. Am. Chem. Soc., 1995,
117, 5385.
- Hoskins BF, Robson R, Slizys DA, J. Am.
Chem. Soc., 1997, 119, 2952.
- Abrahams, B. F., Jackson,
P. A., Robson, R. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. Engli.
1998, 37, 2656
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