Iron-carbonyl complex geometry

Further examples of coordinate bonds are found in metal carbonyl complexes. Metal carbon (carbon monoxide) bond distances in a selection of (first-row) transition-metal carbonyls and transition-metal organometallics are examined in Table 5-11. As expected, Hartree-Fock models do not perform well. The 6-3IG model is clearly superior to the STO-3G and 3-2IG models (both of which lead to completely unreasonable geometries for several compounds), but still exhibits unacceptable errors. For example, the model shows markedly different lengths for the axial and equatorial bonds in iron pentacarbonyl, in contrast to experiment where they are nearly the same. Hartree-Fock models cannot be recommended. 

Comparison of the tropone ring geometry in iron complex 282 with that of the parent tropone shows that the double bond character of the carbonyl group and the bond between C-2 and C-3 in 282 is even higher, probably as a result of dominant contributions from two cyclobutadiene resonance... 

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