A coordination polymer supramolecular isomer formed from a single building block: an unexpected porphyrin ribbon constructed from zinc(tetra(4-pyridyl)porphyrin)

Crystallisation of zinc(tetra(4-pyridyl) porphyrin)[Zn(tpyp)] from a CHCl3/MeOH solution affords single crystals of a new supramolecular isomer of [Zn( tpyp)](infinity), which adopts a polymeric ribbon structure in which a central six-coordinate Zn centre is linked to two five-coordinate Zn cations linking the [Zn(tpyp)] units forming an extended 1-D array three porphyrin units wide.