Synthesis, crystallographic structure and hirshfeld surface analysis of nickel(II) chelate derived from O,N,S-donor tridentate thiosemicarbazone

•A tridentate ONS donor thiosemicarbazone and its nickel complex was synthesized.•The thiosemicarbazone exhibits thioamido form in the solid state whereas in complex it adopts dianionic thiolato form.•The structure of the complex exhibits distorted square planar in geometry.•Hirshfeld surface analysis and the decomposed 2D fingerprint plots provide a visual analysis of various intermolecular interactions present.•The shape index function shows the presence of π..π stacking interactions. New mononuclear complex [NiLβ-pic] has been synthesized by the reaction of Ni(II) acetate with salicylaldehyde 3-azacyclothiosemicarbazone (H2L) in the presence heterocyclic base, β-picoline as an auxiliary ligand. The complex has been investigated by elemental analysis, FT-IR, UV-Vis, 1H NMR and 13C NMR spectroscopy. These data show that the thiosemicarbazone acts as a dianionic tridentate ligand and coordinated to the metal through azomethine nitrogen, thioiminolate sulfur and phenolate oxygen. The coordination sphere is completed by β-picoline. The magnetic susceptibility measurement indicates that the complex is mononuclear and diamagnetic. The structure of the compound is also confirmed by single crystal X-ray crystallography and was found to be distorted square planar in geometry around Ni(II) metal ion centre in which the angles deviated from ideal 90° with a maximum value of 6.85° occupied by azomethine nitrogen, thiolato sulfur, phenolato oxygen and pyridyl nitrogen atoms. Hirshfeld surface analysis (dnorm surfaces and two-dimensional fingerprint plots) for the compound were performed and discussed. [Display omitted]