Pentavalent niobium cation forms a stable yellow-colored binary complex with 6-chloro-3-hydroxy-7-methyl-2-(2’-thienyl)-4H-chromen-4-one (CHMTC) in the ratio of 1:2. The complex is quantitatively extractable into carbon tetrachloride from HClO4 solution maintained at pH 1.26–1.75 and strictly adheres to Beer’s law as verified by the Ringbom plot with an optimized range of determination as 0.385–1.211 ppm of Nb(V). The ligand-metal complex system shows good precision, accuracy, sensitivity, and selectivity and handles satisfactorily the analysis of several samples of varying complexity. The results are highly reproducible as confirmed by statistical data. The stability of the complex is theoretically confirmed with the help of HOMO-LUMO values and the energy gap [for CHMTC, ΔEgap = 3.62 V and for Nb(V)-CHMTC Complex, ΔEgap = 2.97 eV]. The reactivity descriptors were calculated for detailed computational study to probe into the chemical behavior of the studied ligand and its complex. Further, mapped electrostatic potential diagrams help in justifying the donor sites of CHMTC ligand which is in accordance with the analytical findings.
