Europium(III) iodide is an inorganic compound, a salt containing europium and iodine with the chemical formula .
Preparation Europium metal reacts directly with iodine to form europium(III) iodide:
Hydrated europium(III) iodide can be prepared dissolving europium(III) oxide or europium(III) carbonate in hydroiodic acid:
Europium powder reacts with iodine in THF to form a THF adduct of europium(III) iodide:
The adduct can be formulated more simply as .
Structure Europium(III) iodide adopts the bismuth(III) iodide (BiI3) crystal structure type, with octahedral coordination of each Eu3+ ion by 6 iodide ions.
Reactivity Europium(III) iodide is used as the starting material for two of the main ways of preparing europium(II) iodide:
Reduction with hydrogen gas at 350 °C:
Thermal decomposition at 200 °C, a disproportionation reaction:
Europium(III) iodide nonahydrate, EuI3·9H2O, thermally decomposes to europium(II) iodide dihydrate, EuI2·H2O.
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