If the full scientific and technological potential of mesostructured materials is to be achieved, systems with continuous domains in the form of single crystals or films must be prepared. Here we report a reliable and facile system for making large single-crystal particles of chalcogenido mesostructured materials with a highly organized cubic structure, accessible pore structure, and semiconducting properties. Building blocks with square planar bonding topology, Pt(2+) and [Sn(2)Se(6)](4)(-), in combination with long-chain pyridinium surfactants (C(n)PyBr, n = 18, 20) favor faceted single-crystal particles with the highest possible space group symmetry Ia3d. This is an important step toward developing large single-domain crystalline mesostructured semiconductors and usable natural self-assembled antidot array systems. The tendency toward cubic symmetry is so strong that the materials assemble readily under experimental conditions that can tolerate considerable variation and form micrometer-sized rhombic dodecahedral cubosome particles. The c-C(n)PyPtSnSe materials are the first to exhibit reversible ion-exchange properties. The surfactant molecules can be ion-exchanged reversibly and without loss of the cubic structure and particle morphology. The cubosomes possess a three-dimensional open Pt-Sn-Se framework with a low-energy band gap of approximately 1.7 eV.

Open framework metal chalcogenide solids, with pore sizes in the nano- and mesoscale, are of potentially broad technological and fundamental interest in research areas ranging from optoelectronics to the physics of quantum confinement. Although there have been significant advances in the design and synthesis of mesostructured silicas, the construction of their non-oxidic analogues still remains a challenge. Here we describe a synthetic strategy that allows the preparation of a large class of mesoporous materials based on supramolecular assembly of tetrahedral Zintl anions [SnSe4]4- with transition metals in the presence of cetylpyridinium (CP) surfactant molecules. These mesostructured semiconducting selenide materials are of the general formulae (CP)4-2xMxSnSe4 (where 1.0 < x < 1.3; M=Mn, Fe, Co, Zn, Cd, Hg). The resulting materials are open framework chalcogenides and form mesophases with uniform pore size (with spacings between 35 and 40 A). The pore arrangement depends on the synthetic conditions and metal used, and include disordered wormhole, hexagonal and even cubic phases. All compounds are medium bandgap semiconductors (varying between 1.4 and 2.5 eV). We expect that such semiconducting porous networks could be used for optoelectronic, photosynthetic and photocatalytic applications.

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The iron arsenide CaFe(4)As(3) features a three-dimensional network derived from intergrown Fe(2)As(2) layers and Ca ions in channels. Complex magnetic interactions between Fe atoms give rise to unexpected transitions and novel direction-dependent magnetic behavior.