Date of Award

Summer 2023

Document Type

Open Access Thesis

Department

Chemistry and Biochemistry

First Advisor

Hans Conrad zur Loye

Abstract

The chalcogens or the group sixteen elements excluding oxygen, are of interest due to their wide variety of structures and compositions, which gives the potential for a plethora of desired physical properties. This is due to their increased ability to catenate, forming stable chalcogen-chalcogen bonds. When the chalcogens combine with certain main group elements and transition metals they form anionic framework building blocks known as chalcometallates. One such chalcometallate of interest is the thiosilicates, compounds containing Si-S bonds as the anionic frameworks. These compounds are of interest due to their potentials in both their optical and magnetic properties. However, traditional synthesis of chalcogenide compounds has always been plagued by many difficulties. These difficulties include long reaction times, the necessary use of glove boxes, the need for oxygen free starting reagents, and oxide impurities in the product.

A new method for the synthesis of chalcogen containing compounds, The Boron Chalcogen Mixture (BCM) method has also emerged in recent literature. The BCM method tackles many of these longstanding issues in traditional thiosilicate synthesis. This has allowed for a rapid increase in the synthesis and analyzation of these thiosilicate compounds. This work proves the effectiveness of the BCM method in the synthesis of novel thiosilicate compounds, all while analyzing the properties these compounds exhibit for potential industrial use. By using the BCM method with traditional synthetic methods, we have been able to synthesize over 30 novel thiosilicate compounds, solving their unique crystal structures, and analyzing both their magnetic and optical properties.

Rights

© 2023, Adam Alexander King

Download

Included in

Chemistry Commons

Share

COinS