Tris(acetylacetonato)titanium(III), often abbreviated Ti(acac)₃, is a

coordination complex A coordination complex is a chemical compound consisting of a central atom or ion, which is usually metallic and is called the ''coordination centre'', and a surrounding array of chemical bond, bound molecules or ions, that are in turn known as ' ...

of titanium(III) featuring acetylacetonate (acac)

ligand In coordination chemistry, a ligand is an ion or molecule with a functional group that binds to a central metal atom to form a coordination complex. The bonding with the metal generally involves formal donation of one or more of the ligand's el ...

s, making it one of a family of

metal acetylacetonates Metal acetylacetonates are coordination complexes derived from the acetylacetone, acetylacetonate anion () and metal ions, usually transition metals. The bidentate ligand acetylacetonate is often abbreviated acac. Typically both oxygen atoms bind t ...

. It is a blue air-sensitive solid that dissolves in nonpolar organic solvents. The compound is prepared by treating

titanium trichloride Titanium(III) chloride is the inorganic compound with the formula TiCl3. At least four distinct species have this formula; additionally hydrated derivatives are known. TiCl3 is one of the most common halides of titanium and is an important catalys ...

with

acetylacetone Acetylacetone is an organic compound with the chemical formula . It is classified as a 1,3-diketone. It exists in equilibrium with a tautomer . The mixture is a colorless liquid. These tautomers interconvert so rapidly under most conditions that ...

in the presence of base. Being paramagnetic, it gives a contact-shifted

proton NMR Proton nuclear magnetic resonance (proton NMR, hydrogen-1 NMR, or 1H NMR) is the application of nuclear magnetic resonance in NMR spectroscopy with respect to hydrogen-1 nuclei within the molecules of a substance, in order to determine the stru ...

signal at 60 ppm upfield of TMS assigned to the methyl group.

Structure

It is an octahedral complex. The Ti-O bonds lengths range from 2.023 to 2.013 Å, the large variation being attributed to the Jahn-Teller effect. Ti(acac)₃ possesses

helical chirality In chemistry, axial chirality is a special case of chirality in which a molecule contains two pairs of chemical groups in a non-planar arrangement about an axis of chirality so that the molecule is not superposable on its mirror image. The axis of ...

, giving rise to Δ- and Λ-

enantiomer In chemistry, an enantiomer (Help:IPA/English, /ɪˈnænti.əmər, ɛ-, -oʊ-/ Help:Pronunciation respelling key, ''ih-NAN-tee-ə-mər''), also known as an optical isomer, antipode, or optical antipode, is one of a pair of molecular entities whi ...

s. It is a precatalyst for Ziegler-Natta catalysis.

References

{{Acetylacetonate complexes Acetylacetonate complexes