Preparation and X-ray analysis of trimethylsulfonium sulfate [(CH3)3S+]2SO2−4

Abstract
Trimethylsulfonium sulfate, [(CH3)3S+]2SO42−, has been prepared and subjected to X-ray analysis. The crystals are monoclinic, space group C2/c, with a = 10.38(1), b = 10.55(1), c = 10.50(1)Å, β = 90.55(8)° and Z = 4. The structure was solved by direct methods and refined by full-matrix anisotropic least squares with 745 observed CuKα film data to R = 0.101. The sulfonium ions induce charge localization in each sulfate group, reducing its molecular symmetry from [unk]3m to 2. The crystal structure may be described as a packing of 2:1 ionic aggregates corresponding to the chemical formula.