In situ hydrothermal synthesis of dysprosium(iii) single-molecule magnet with lanthanide salt as catalystElectronic supplementary information (ESI) available. CCDC 808461 for 1, 808463 for 2, 842876 for 3, 808462 for 4, 842877 for 5 and 842875 for 6. For ESI and crystallographic data in CIF or other electronic format see DOI: 10.1039/c2dt30175j

A family of six dinuclear lanthanide complexes have been obtained via in situ hydrothermal synthesis with lanthanide ions as catalyst. These six complexes are formulated as [Ln 2 (3-Htzba) 2 (3-tzba) 2 (H 2 O) 8 ]·4H 2 O [Ln = Gd, 1 ; Dy, 2 ; Eu, 3 ; Tb, 4 ; Sm, 5 ; Er, 6 ; 3-H 2 tzba = 3-(1 H -tetrazol-5-yl)benzoic acid]. The magnetic investigations show that complex 2 behaves as a single-molecule magnet (SMM) with a quantum relaxation time of ∼10 −2 s. In situ hydrothermal synthesis using lanthanide ions as catalyst affords six dinuclear lanthanide complexes, of which the dysprosium complex behaves as a single-molecule magnet (SMM) with a quantum relaxation time of ∼10 −2 s.