COORDINATION CHEMISTRY OF N-6 MACROCYCLES

Although the first saturated N-4 macrocycle, namely cyclam, was obtain ed by Van Alpen [1] in 1937, it was only following the pioneering work of Curtis [2] on the template synthesis of N-containing macrocycles t hat great interest was shown towards polyazamacrocycles and their meta l complexes. Since then the field has been very active owing to their application in analytical practice and industry, for modelling some bi osystems, transport processes in the biosphere, stabilization of high oxidation states, selective ion recognition, catalytic and extraction properties etc. [3-5].