<i>Polyoxometalates</i>: An interdisciplinary journal focused on all aspects of polyoxometalates
Yongge Wei
Abstract
Polyoxometalates (POMs) are negatively-charged molecular metal oxides with well-defined structures, beautiful geometries and nanoscale sizes. Due to expansive diversity in terms of their composition, structure, nuclearity and charge, they form a huge subfamily of inorganic clusters, which hold bridging oxygen atoms among two or more metal ions. The early history of POMs is dated back to 1788, when Scheele studied reduced molybdenum salts and discovered the first examples of Molybdenum Blues. Some years later, in 1826, Berzelius described his discovery of the ammonium phosphomolybdate, a yellow precipitate containing the anion [PMo 12 O 40 ] 3-. Since that time the advances on the synthesis of POMs have been growing year by year. Yet, it was not until 1934, more than one century after the first discovery of POMs, the British physicist J. F. Keggin determined, using powder X-ray diffraction measurements, the structure of the phosphotungstic acid H 3 [PW 12 O 40 )]29H 2 O which is known as the Keggin structure. Subsequently, the basic structures of Anderson, Dawson, Waugh, Silverton, Lindqvist, Standberg, Finke, Weakley and other POM compounds were reported one after another.