Ionothermal Synthesis and Photoactivity of Ti₁₇ and Ti₁₉-Oxo Clusters Functionalized by Sulfate and 1,10-Phenanthroline Ligands

In this study, we successfully synthesized two titanium-oxo clusters, namely Ti-19(mu(3)-O)(19)(mu(2)-O)(10)(1,10-phn)(2)((OPr)-Pr-i)(18)] (PTC-178) and (EMIm)(3)[Ti-17(mu(4)-O)(4)(mu(3)-O)(16)(mu(2)-O)(4)(SO4)(3)(mu(2)-OiPr)(4)((OPr)-Pr-i)(13)] (PTC-179). These clusters were synthesized using an ionothermal reaction and possess similar nuclearity (Ti-19 vs. Ti-17) moieties. Additionally, we observed that these complexes exhibit varying activities for photocatalytic degradation of Methylene Blue (MB) dye and distinct photocurrent responses for photoelectrochemical studies due to their different surface-decorated ligands. This study provides valuable insights into the design of Ti-oxo molecular clusters with similar nuclearity but different surface environments, allowing for the establishment of critical structure-property relationships. Furthermore, our research contributes to the exploration of sustainable synthetic methods for high nuclearity TOCs using ionic liquids.