Serendipitous syntheses of the series Cs(3)Ln(7)Te(12) (Ln = Sm, Gd, Tb): Compounds with large tunnels

Single crystals of Cs(3)Ln(7)Te(12) (Ln = Sm, Gd, Tb) have been grown accid entally through the reaction of Ln and Te with a CsCl or Cs2Te3 flux at ele vated temperatures. The crystal structures have been determined from single crystal X-ray diffraction data. These compounds, which are isostructural w ith Rb3Yb7Se12, crystallize in space group Pnnm of the orthorhombic system with two molecules in the following cells: Cs3Sm7Te12, a = 13.750(6), b = 2 8.332(7), c = 4.473(3) Angstrom, T = 293 K; Cs3Gd7Te12, a = 13.6064(13), b = 28.209(3), c = 4.4324(4) Angstrom, T = 153 K; Cs3Tb7Te12, a = 13.5708(16) , b = 28.116(3), c = 4.4147(5) Angstrom, T = 153 K. (C) 2001 Editions scien tifiques et medicales Elsevier SAS. All rights reserved.