Amino Acid-Directed Synthesis of Chiral Manganese Chlorides with One-Dimensional Helical Structures

Two enantiomorphic metal halides, namely, ( l -C 3 H 8 NO 2 )[MnCl 3 (H 2 O) 2 ] ( 1L ) and ( d -C 3 H 8 NO 2 )[MnCl 3 (H 2 O) 2 ] ( 1D ), have been synthesized using l -alanine and d -alanine as structure-directing agents, respectively. They exhibit unique one-dimensional helical architectures built up of corner-sharing MnCl 4 (H 2 O) 2 octahedra. Protonated alanine molecules separate the inorganic chains and interact with them via strong hydrogen bonds. The two hybrid materials display red luminescence under 415 nm light irradiation. Their second-harmonic-generation responses and circularly polarized luminescence activities were also investigated.