Highly cooperative ion-pair recognition of potassium cyanide using a heteroditopic ferrocene-based crown ether-trifluoroacetylcarboxanilide receptor

Article abstract of DOI:10.1039/b715633b

A heteroditopic receptor having crown ether and trifluoroacetylcarboxanilide groups selectively recognizes both potassium and cyanide ions in acetonitrile with an association constant of as high as K _a = 1.9 × 10⁷ M^-1 through a highly cooperative ion-pair interaction, resulting in two orders of magnitude enhancement in the binding affinity. The Royal Society of Chemistry.