Ruthenium oxyhydride phases

Transition-metal oxyhydrides (phases containing both O2- and H-) can exhibit physical properties which are distinctly different from their corresponding oxides, principally because the hydride anion has no pi-symmetry valence orbitals, so cannot contribute to pi-symmetry bands in these phases, leading to qualitatively different electronic band structures for oxyhydride phases compared to all-oxide analogues. We have extended the synthesis of transition metal oxyhydrides to prepare a series of ruthenium-containing phases, based on cation-ordered oxide phases. We propose to collect neutron powder diffraction data these novel materials as this technique is uniquely suitable for determining the concentration and distribution of hydride ions within these phases and characterizing the ordered magnetic states these materials adopt at low temperature.