Synthesis, crystal structure and magnetic properties of a new copper oxo-antimony sulphate CuSb6O8(SO4)2

The new copper oxo-antimony sulphate CuSb6O8(SO4)2 crystallizes in the triclinic space group P1[combining macron] with the unit cell parameters a = 5.5342(4) Å, b = 7.6706(6) Å, c = 9.2374(7) Å, α = 96.505(5)°, β = 93.818(4)°, γ = 109.733(4)° and Z = 1. The crystal structure is made up of layers stacking along [001]. The layers are charge neutral and are connected to each other by only weak interactions. The copper atoms adopt a square planar [CuO4] coordination and such units are well separated from each other by corner and edge sharing to [SbO4] building blocks. The latter polymerize to form sheets with the formula [Sb3O8]∞. Sulphate groups connect to the antimony oxide sheets by corner sharing and are located at the interface of the layers. Above ∼10 K the magnetic susceptibility follows very well a Curie-Weiss law whereas below 10 K increasing deviations indicate the onset of antiferromagnetic correlations. Fitting the data in the range 10-50 K yields a Curie-Weiss temperature θ of -2.25(5) K. A sharp anomaly centered at TC = 0.67 K in the heat capacity data indicates long-range magnetic ordering. Short range antiferromagnetic correlations well above TC are seen in the magnetic contribution to the heat capacity and the magnetic susceptibility. These can be well described by the magnetism of a spin S = 1/2 Heisenberg chain with the nearest neighbor antiferromagnetic spin exchange interaction of Jintra = ∼2.8 K.