Determination of the electronic and structural configuration of coordination compounds by synchrotron-radiation techniques

In this review we provide an overview of the potential of synchrotron radiation techniques to understand the structural and electronic properties of coordination compounds. Besides the largely employed multi-wavelength anomalous dispersion (MAD) and X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS), in both near (XANES) and post (EXAFS) edge regions, we also discuss the contribution arising from more specialized techniques that have become more widely used in the last years, such as the total scattering approach in the XRPD data analysis and X-ray emission spectroscopy (XES). Comparison with the commonly used laboratory techniques (XRD, UV-vis, luminescence, NMR, EPR) is used to underline the added value of synchrotron radiation techniques when applied to already well characterized samples. The fundamental role of DFT calculations in interpreting both diffraction and spectroscopic data to understand structural and electronic properties of coordination complexes is highlighted. A perspective summary is reported at the end of the manuscript. (C) 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.