Anti-Electrostatic Pi-Hole Bonding: How Covalency Conquers Coulombics

Intermolecular bonding attraction at π-bonded centers is often described as “electrostatically driven” and given quasi-classical rationalization in terms of a “pi hole” depletion region in the electrostatic potential. However, we demonstrate here that such bonding attraction also occurs between closed-shell ions of like charge, thereby yielding locally stable complexes that sharply violate classical electrostatic expectations. Standard DFT and MP2 computational methods are employed to investigate complexation of simple pi-bonded diatomic anions (BO−, CN−) with simple atomic anions (H−, F−) or with one another. Such “anti-electrostatic” anion–anion attractions are shown to lead to robust metastable binding wells (ranging up to 20–30 kcal/mol at DFT level, or still deeper at dynamically correlated MP2 level) that are shielded by broad predissociation barriers (ranging up to 1.5 Å width) from long-range ionic dissociation. Like-charge attraction at pi-centers thereby provides additional evidence for the dominance of 3-center/4-electron (3c/4e) nD-π*AX interactions that are fully analogous to the nD-σ*AH interactions of H-bonding. Using standard keyword options of natural bond orbital (NBO) analysis, we demonstrate that both n-σ* (sigma hole) and n-π* (pi hole) interactions represent simple variants of the essential resonance-type donor-acceptor (Bürgi–Dunitz-type) attraction that apparently underlies all intermolecular association phenomena of chemical interest. We further demonstrate that “deletion” of such π*-based donor-acceptor interaction obliterates the characteristic Bürgi–Dunitz signatures of pi-hole interactions, thereby establishing the unique cause/effect relationship to short-range covalency (“charge transfer”) rather than envisioned Coulombic properties of unperturbed monomers.

A summary of results obtained with the cryogenic electrostatic storage ring DESIREE

This paper highlights results from recent studies of cryogenically cooled atomic and molecular anions carried out at the DESIREE storage ring facility at Stockholm University in Stockholm, Sweden. These results include measurements of lifetimes of excited metastable states in atomic anions (S−, Se−, Te−, Ni−, and Pt−), pilot studies of rotational cooling of OH−, and cooling and decay of cluster anions exemplified by results for Ag5−.