A one-step copper-catalyzed reaction of aldehyde-derived N-substituted hydrazones with CCl4 resulted in efficient synthesis of 4,4-dichloro-1,2-diazabuta-1,3-dienes. It was proven that this C–C bond-forming cascade reaction operates via an addition of trichloromethyl radical to the CN bond of hydrazone followed by a base-induced elimination of HCl. The reaction was found to be very general, as diverse hydrazones possessing various aromatic groups at N-site, as well as aromatic, aliphatic, and heterocyclic substituents at C-site, are capable partners for coupling with a wide range of polyhalogenated compounds (CCl3Br, CBr4, CCl3CN, CCl3COOEt, CCl3CF3, CBr3CF3) to produce a family of functionalized 1,2-diazabuta-1,3-dienes. It was demonstrated that the prepared heterodienes are highly versatile building blocks for straightforward assembly of various valuable acyclic and heterocyclic molecules.

Accurate bond dissociation energies for large molecules are difficult to obtain by either experimental or computational methods. The former methods are hampered by a range of physical and practical limitations in gas-phase measurement techniques, while the latter require incorporation of multiple approximations whose impact on accuracy may not always be clear. When internal benchmarks are not available, one hopes that experiment and theory can mutually support each other. A recent report found, however, a large discrepancy between gas-phase bond dissociation energies, measured mass spectrometrically, and the corresponding quantities computed using density functional theory (DFT)-D3 and DLPNO-CCSD(T) methods. With the widespread application of these computational methods to large molecular systems, the discrepancy needs to be resolved. We report a series of experimental studies that validate the mass spectrometric methods from small to large ions and find that bond dissociation energies extracted from threshold collision-induced dissociation experiments on large ions do indeed behave correctly. The implications for the computational studies are discussed.

Cryogenic ion vibrational predissociation (CIVP) spectroscopy of a gas-phase molecular torsion balance to probe London dispersion forces in large molecules.

Rapidly developing mid-infrared quantum cascade laser (QCL) technology gives easy access to broadly tunable mid-IR laser radiation at a modest cost. Despite several applications of QCL in the industry, its usage for spectroscopic investigation of synthetically relevant organic compounds has been limited. Here we report the application of an external cavity, continuous wave, mid-IR QCL to cryogenic ion vibrational predissociation spectroscopy (CIVP) to analyze a set of large organic molecules, organometallic complexes, and isotopically labeled compounds. The obtained spectra of test molecules are characterized by high signal-to-noise ratio and low FWHM-values, allowing the assignment of two compounds with just a few wavenumbers difference. Data generated by cw-QCL and spectra produced by another standard Nd:YAG DFG system are compared and discussed.

We report an evaluation of the importance of London dispersion in moderately large (up to 36 heavy atoms) organic molecules by means of a molecular torsion balance whose conformations "weigh" one interaction against another in the absence of solvents. The experimental study, with gas-phase cryogenic ion vibrational predissociation (CIVP) spectroscopy, solid-state Fourier transfer infrared (FT-IR), and single-crystal Xray crystallography, is accompanied by density functional theory calculations, including an extensive search and analysis of accessible conformations. We begin with the unsubstituted molecular torsion balance, and then step up the complexity systematically by adding alkyl groups incrementally as dispersion energy donors (DEDs) to achieve a degree of chemical complexity comparable to what is typically found in transition states for many regio-and stereoselective reactions in organic and organometallic chemistry. We find clear evidence for the small attractive contribution by DEDs, as had been reported in other studies, but we also find that small individual contributions by London dispersion, when they operate in opposition to other weak noncovalent interactions, produce composite effects on the structure that are difficult to predict intuitively, or by modern quantum chemical calculations. The experimentally observed structures, together with a reasonable value for a reference cation−π interaction, indicate that the pairwise interaction between two tert-butyl groups, in the best case, is modest. Moreover, the visualization of the conformational space, and comparison to spectroscopic indicators of the structure, as one steps up the complexity of the manifold of noncovalent interactions, makes clear that in silico predictive ability for the structure of moderately large, flexible, organic molecules falters sooner than one might have expected.