Mike Laidlaw

Stipendiary Lecturer Inorganic Chemistry

Teaching

I usually teach inorganic chemistry to one year group of chemistry students at University College, but occasionally do more including first year physical chemistry.  I teach core inorganic chemistry to 1st, 2nd and 3rd year MChem students at several other colleges in Oxford and have done this for more than 20 years.

Research

My research has focussed on studying the electronic structure of cyanide-bridged mixed valence transition metal complexes.  Originally through optical, nonlinear optical and electrochemical methods, my most recent work hinges around using electron and nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopies to investigate the electronic coupling between indirectly linked metals through the distribution of unpaired electron spin density in these paramagnetic systems.

Selected Publications

W.M.Laidlaw, R.G.Denning, T.Verbiest, E.Chauchard and A.Persoons, Nature (1993), 363, 58-60.  Large second-order optical polarisabilities in mixed-valence metal complexes.

W.M.Laidlaw, R.G.Denning, T.Verbiest, E.Chauchard and A.Persoons, in Organic, Metallo-organic and Polymeric Materials for Nonlinear Optical Applications, Proc. SPIE -Int. Soc. Opt. Eng. (1994), 2143 14-19, (Ed. S. R. Marder and J. W. Perry).  Second-order nonlinearity in mixed-valence metal chromophores.

W.M.Laidlaw and R.G.Denning, J. Chem. Soc. Dalton Trans., (1994), 1987-1994.  Synthesis and characterisation of cyanide-bridged heterobinuclear mixed-valence compounds based on cyclopentadienylorganophosphine -ruthenium(II), -osmium(II) cyano and pentaammine -ruthenium(III), -osmium(III) moieties.

W.M.Laidlaw and R.G.Denning,  Inorg. Chim. Acta., (1996), 248, 51-58.  Heterobi-, tri- and tetra-metallic cyanide-bridged complexes based on pentacarbonylcyanochromate(0) and penta-, cis-tetra- and fac-tri-ammineruthenium(III) groups : Optical Metal-Metal Charge Transfer and Electrochemical Characteristics.

I.D.Morrison, R.G.Denning, W.M.Laidlaw and M.A.Stammers, Rev. Sci. Instrum., (1996), 67, 1445-1453.  The measurement of first hyperpolarisabilities by hyper-Rayleigh scattering.

G.Bublitz, W.M.Laidlaw, S.G.Boxer and R.G.Denning, J. Am. Chem. Soc., (1998), 120, 6068-6075.  Effective charge transfer distances in cyanide-bridged mixed-valence transition metal complexes.

W.M.Laidlaw, R.G.Denning, D.M.Murphy and J.C.Green, Dalton Trans., (2008), 6257-6264.  Solvent dependence of the g-anisotropy in the ESR of cyanide-bridged mixed-valence complexes.

W.M.Laidlaw and R.G.Denning, Chem. Commun. (2008), 1590-1592.  13C cyanide NMR studies in paramagnetic cyanide bridged mixed-valence compounds.

W.M. Laidlaw, A.L. Thompson and R.G. Denning, J. Chem. Soc. Dalton Trans., (2013) 4695-4703.  Solvent and metal dependent 1H NMR hyperfine shifts in paramagnetic pentaamminemetal cyanide-bridged mixed-valence complexes.

W.M.Laidlaw, R.G. Denning, J.C. Green, J. Boyd, J. Harmer and A.L. Thompson, Inorg. Chem. (2013), 52, 7280-7294.  140 H/D isotopomers identified by long-range NMR hyperfine shifts in ruthenium(III) ammine complexes. Hyperconjugation in Ru-NH3 bonding.