Learning Goals:

Learning Objectives:  Going into this exercise:

1. Students should be able to determine the oxidation state and d electron count for a given set of metal complexes.
2. Based on the d electron configuration of a metal ion, students should be able to propose whether that metal ion should prefer a tetrahedral or a square planar geometry for a 4 coordinate complex.
3. Students should have been introduced to the Jahn-Teller distortion.

Following the Presentation/Discussion:

1. Students should be introduced to the concept that there are ligands that will force (or less successfully distort while trying to force) tetrahedral geometry on metals ions with d electron configurations that prefer to have a different geometry.

2. Students should be introduced to the concept that by favoring one geometry over another, one oxidation state of a metal can be preferred over another for a given metal.

3. Students will be introduced to one application of how ligands of this type can be used to facilitate experiments that probe the chemistry of certain metalloproteins.