A bis-chelate o-vanillin-2-ethano-lamine copper(II) complex bearing both imine and amine forms of the ligand.

The mol-ecular bis-chelate complex (2-{[(2-hy-droxy-ethyl-κO)amino-κN]meth-yl}-6-meth-oxy-phenolato-κO)(2-{[(2-hy-droxy-eth-yl)imino-κN]meth-yl}-6-meth-oxy-phenolato-κO)copper(II), [Cu(C10H14NO3)(C10H12NO3)] or [Cu(HL im)(HL am); HL im = C10H14NO3; HL am = C10H12NO3, represents the first compound containing a salicyl-idene-2-ethano-lamine type ligand in both imino HL im (Schiff base) and amino HL am (reduced Schiff base) forms that has been structurally characterized on the basis of X-ray data. Two mol-ecules of the monodeprotonated ligands coordinate the CuII ion in an (N,O phen)-bidentate and an (N,O phen,O alc)-tridentate fashion in the case of the imino and amino forms, respectively. The shape of the CuN2O3 coordination polyhedron is a distorted square-pyramid (geometry index τ5 = 0.26). Inter-molecular N-H⋯O and O-H⋯O hydrogen bonds, involving H atoms of the amino and hy-droxy-ethyl groups, create a two-dimensional supra-molecular array extending parallel to (010). © Plyuta et al. 2021.