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Nitroxyl (HNO) and hydrogen peroxide have both been implicated in a variety of reactions relevant to environmental and physiological processes and may contribute to a unique, unexplored, pathway for the production of nitrous acid (HONO) in soil. To investigate the potential for this reaction, we report an in-depth investigation of the reaction pathway of H 2 O 2 and HNO forming HONO and water. We find the breaking of the peroxide bond and a coupled proton transfer in the first step leads to hydrogen nitryl (HNO 2 ) and an endogenous water, with an extrapolated NEVPT2 (multireference perturbation theory) barrier of 29.3 kcal mol −1 . The first transition state is shown to possess diradical character linking the far peroxide oxygen to the bridging, reacting, peroxide oxygen. The energy of this first step, when calculated using hybrid density functional theory, is shown to depend heavily on the amount of Hartree–Fock exchange in the functional, with higher amounts leading to a higher barrier and more diradical character. Additionally, high amounts of spin contamination cause CCSD(T) to significantly overestimate the TS1 barrier with a value of 36.2 kcal mol −1 when using the stable UHF wavefunction as the reference wavefunction. However, when using the restricted Hartree–Fock reference wavefunction, the TS1 CCSD(T) energy is lowered to yield a barrier of 31.2 kcal mol −1 , in much better agreement with the NEVPT2 result. The second step in the reaction is the isomerization of HNO 2 to trans -HONO through a Grotthuss-like mechanism accepting a proton from and donating a proton to the endogenous water. This new mechanism for the isomerization of HNO 2 is shown to have an NEVPT2 barrier of 23.3 kcal mol −1 , much lower than previous unimolecular estimates not including an explicit water. Finally, inclusion of an additional explicit water is shown to lower the HNO 2 isomerization barrier even further.
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This content will become publicly available on February 28, 2026
Chiral π-Conjugated Double Helical Aminyl Diradical with the Triplet Ground State
Abstract We describe effective development of the highly diastereoselective synthesis of double helical tetraamine 2-H2-C2 and propose a mechanism for its formation. The resolution of 2-H2-C2 is facilitated by a high racemization barrier of 43 kcal mol–1 and it is implemented via either a chiral auxiliary or preparative supercritical fluid chromatography. This enables preparation of the first high-spin neutral diradical, with spin density delocalized within an enantiomeric double helical π-system. The presence of two effective 3-electron C–N bonds in the diradical leads to: (1) the triplet (S = 1) high-spin ground state with a singlet-triplet energy gap of 0.4 kcal mol–1 and (2) the long half-life of up to 6 days in 2-MeTHF at room temperature. The diradical possesses a racemization barrier of at least 26 kcal mol–1 in 2-MeTHF at 293 K and chiroptical properties, with an absorption anisotropy factor |g| ≈ 0.005 at 548 nm. These unique magnetic and optical properties of our diradical form the basis for the development of next-generation spintronic devices. 1 Introduction 2 Synthesis and Resolution of the C 2-Symmetric Double Helical Tetraamine 2-H2-C 2 3 Synthesis and Characterization of Neutral High-Spin Aminyl Diradical 22• -C 2 4 Conclusion
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- PAR ID:
- 10594329
- Publisher / Repository:
- Thieme
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Synlett
- Volume:
- 36
- Issue:
- 05
- ISSN:
- 0936-5214
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- 431 to 437
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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