Why magnesium alkoxide is called complex as it don't consist any transition element?

1 Answer
Jul 28, 2017

Magnesium alkoxides are called complexes because they often exist as complex "clusters" of the alkoxide.

Explanation:

Alkoxide ions are good bridging ligands, that is, they can form bonds to two or more metal ions.

You see this, for example, in the dimer of "FeCl"_3FeCl3

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where "Cl"Cl atoms act as bridging ligands between the two "Fe"Fe atoms.

Thus, four magnesium methoxide units combine in solution to form cubic structures of ["Mg"_4("OCH"_3)_8"(CH"_3"OH")_8][Mg4(OCH3)8(CH3OH)8].

TetramerTetramer
(Adapted from [ RSC ] Publishing - Royal Society of Chemistry)

The diagram shows only the "Mg"Mg atoms (blue) and the "O"O atoms (red).

One of the "OCH"_3OCH3 groups from each "Mg"("OCH"_3)_2Mg(OCH3)2 is at a corner of the cubic structure, and the second is outside the cube.

Two methanol molecules are also coordinated to each "Mg"Mg atom.