Reaction of AsF5 and SbF5 with elemental selenium and tellurium and with TeF4 and Te(OTeF5)4

Arsenic and antimony pentafluorides are versatile oxidizing agents that have been used to prepare a variety of new species. The reactions of these reagents with Se and Te and with mixtures of these two elements have been studied in some detail and a variety of cationic species of these elements have been prepared. Among the species containing both selenium and tellurium these include Te2Se22+, Te2Se42+, Te2Se62+ and Te2Se82+. The reactions have been followed using 77Se and 125Te nmr spectros copy and the structures of the hexafluorarsenate and hexafluorantimonate salts that have been isolated have been determined by X-ray crystallography.During the course of the work on the oxidation of Te with AsF5 it became of interest to study the reaction of TeF4 with AsF5 and the results of this study and a similar study of the analogous reaction with Te(OTeF5)4 will be reported. Among the products of the latter reaction new ionic species such as Tex(OTeF53−x+ and AsFx(OTeF5)6−x− have been observed.