Posts Tagged ‘large interaction energy’

The nature of the C≡S Triple bond: Part 2

Saturday, December 5th, 2009

In my first post on this theme, an ELF (Electron localization function) analysis of the bonding in the molecule HO-S≡C-H (DOI: 10.1002/anie.200903969) was presented. This analysis identified a lone pair of electrons localized on the carbon (integrating in fact to almost exactly 2.0) in addition to electrons in the CC region. This picture seems to indicate that the triple bond splits into two well defined regions of electron density (synaptic basins). In a comment to this post, I also pointed out that an NBO analysis showed a large interaction energy between the carbon lone pair and the S-O σ* orbital, characteristic of anomeric effects (in eg sugars). This latter observation gives us a handle on possibly tweaking the effect. Thus if the S-O σ* orbital can be made a better electron acceptor, then its interaction with the lone pair could be enhanced.

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