ORGANOMETALLIC INTERCALATION COMPOUNDS OF FEOCL

The layered transition metal oxyhalide FeOCl has been found to undergo direct intercalation by the organometallic molecular compounds ferrocene and cobaltocene. From x-ray powder diffraction studies, it has been shown that the Van der Waals gap between the FeOCl layers expands by roughly 5Å to accomodate the metallocene. With either metallocene, the data accurately fit a body centered orthorhombic unit cell. A structural model consistent with the observations is proposed, based on a simple shift of alternate FeOCl layers by one-half unit cell in the [101] direction (a-c diagonal) accompanied by the interlayer expansion. There is no evidence for ordering within the metallocene layers. The intercalation of ferrocene is especially significant because its first ionization potential (6.88 eV) is substantially higher than those of organometallic compounds previously intercalated into transition metal dichalcogenides. © 1979.