The reaction of 2 equiv of the air-stable primary phosphine (ferrocenylmethyl)phosphine (PH
2CH
2Fc,
1) with [Pd(cod)Cl
2] (Fc = ferrocenyl; cod = 1,5-cyclooctadiene) at 298 K gave the phosphanido-bridged Pd(II) tetramer[Pd(PH
2CH
2Fc)Cl(
![](/images/entities/mgr.gif)
-PHCH
2Fc)]
4 (
2), which shows an unprecedented arrangement of four Pd atoms embedded inan eight-membered Pd
4P
4 ring. An X-ray diffraction study showed that
2 crystallizes in the triclinic space group
P![](/images/entities/onemacr.gif)
with
a = 17.607(7) Å,
b = 17.944(7) Å,
c = 18.792(7) Å,
![](/images/gifchars/alpha.gif)
= 107.120(12)
![](/images/entities/deg.gif)
,
![](/images/gifchars/beta2.gif)
= 96.344(13)
![](/images/entities/deg.gif)
,
![](/images/gifchars/gamma.gif)
= 117.087(15)
![](/images/entities/deg.gif)
.Each molecule contains four palladium atoms in a distorted square-planar coordination formed by one chlorine andthree phosphorus atoms. Two of the latter belong to bridging primary phosphanides and the remaining one iscontributed by a terminal PH
2CH
2Fc ligand. The coordination environments of neighboring metal centers adopt analmost perpendicular mutual orientation. The reaction of 2 equiv of
1 with [Pt(cod)Cl
2] at 323 K yielded the analogousPt(II) tetramer of formula [Pt(PH
2CH
2Fc)Cl(
![](/images/entities/mgr.gif)
-PHCH
2Fc)]
4 (
3), which was fully characterized by multinuclear anddynamic NMR, IR, and elemental analyses. Single-crystal X-ray diffraction on
3 confirmed the tetranuclear arrangementin the solid state, but orientational disorder of the molecule precludes a more detailed discussion of the structure.Low-temperature NMR experiments in CD
2Cl
2 showed the presence of two slowly interconnecting conformers.Reaction of
1 and [M(cod)Cl
2] (M = Pd or Pt) at lower temperatures (273 K for Pd, 295 K for Pt) in dichloromethaneallowed the detection in solution of the mononuclear species
cis-[M(PH
2CH
2Fc)
2Cl
2] (M = Pd,
4; M = Pt,
5) which,upon heating, transformed into the tetramers
2 and
3, respectively. Solid samples of
4 and
5 could be isolatedafter workup at low temperature and were characterized by conventional spectroscopic methods.