Presented here are the structures and magnetism of two isostructural magnetic Cl-bridged chain compounds of the type (H2mela)2[MCl5]Cl (melamelamine, MFe(II) (class=""boldFont"">1), MMn(II) (class=""boldFont"">2)). The chain structure is formed along the Jahn-Teller elongation axis of the MCl6 octahedra. In compound class=""boldFont"">1, the Cl? ion transmits an antiferromagnetic exchange interaction that, combined with the magnetic anisotropy of the Fe(II) sites, gives rise to a canted antiferromagnetic arrangement of the spins. Detailed magnetic studies revealed that class=""boldFont"">1 exhibits slow magnetic relaxation behavior like single-chain magnet (SCM), and that the finite size effects, due to naturally occurring defects, strongly influences the static and dynamic properties of class=""boldFont"">1. The contribution of the correlation length to the energy barrier has also been investigated.
The Mn compound class=""boldFont"">2 is an isotropic Heisenberg chain with antiferromagnetic coupling between the Mn(II) ions. Doped crystals of class=""boldFont"">Zn1, class=""boldFont"">Cu1-class=""boldFont"">Cu5 and class=""boldFont"">Mn1-class=""boldFont"">Mn5 were synthesized by introducing different contents of Zn(II), Cu(II) and Mn(II) ions to study the magnetic dilution and decoupling phenomena, respectively.