Characterization of potassium and sodium-potassium alloy solutions containing metal anions and complexed cations by means of NMR and ESR techniques

The influence of a complexing agent, kind of solvent and temperature on the stability and ionic composition of potassium and sodium-potassium alloy so lutions containing metal anions and complexed cations as well as solvated e lectrons are discussed basing on the analysis of alkali metal NMR and ESR s pectra. Surprisingly it seems that the stability of metal solutions in tetr ahydrofuran at ambient temperature is inversely proportional to the durabil ity of KC complex in the case of five studied ligands. The most stable meta l solutions were obtained using 15-crown-5. It was shown that the character istic blue colour of metal solutions is not connected with the presence of solvated electrons but with metal anions. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. AI I rights reserved.