Structural Studies of Gold(I, II, and III) Compounds with Pentafluorophenyl and Tetrahydrothiophene Ligands

A golden opportunity was seized to prepare an unbridged, dinucleur gold(II) compound, [Au2(C6F5)4(tht)2] (tht=tetrahydrothiophene), without any stabilizing chelating ligands (see picture; Au orange, S yellow, F green, C black) and to crystallographically characterize the gold(I) and gold(III) complexes participating in this conversion. A unique ligand scrambling of the latter gold(III) compound occurs in solution.