Isobaric and isochoric freezing of CH2BrCl and isostructural relations between CH2Cl2, CH2Br2 and CH2BrCl
Bromochloromethane, CH2BrCl, has been temperature-frozen and in situ pressure-frozen and the structure determined by X-ray diffraction at low temperatures of 170 and 100 K at ambient pressure (0.10 MPa), and at high pressures of 1.04 and 1.72 GPa at room temperature (295 K). CH2BrCl exhibits a remarkable polymorphism: at low temperature it crystallizes in the monoclinic space group C2/c (phase I), isostructural to the crystals of CH2Br2. The pressure-frozen crystal of CH2BrCl is orthorhombic, space group Pbcn, and is isostructural to the crystal of CH2Cl2. In both phases I and II the Br and Cl atoms are substitutionally disordered. The freezing temperatures and pressures of simple dihalomethanes have been correlated to their molecular weight and halogen... ˙˙halogen distances. Calculated electrostatic potential surfaces have been related to the different crystal packing of dihalomethanes investigated.