Computational study of conformations and of sulfinyl oxygen-induced pentacoordination at silicon in 4-chloro-4-silathiacyclohexane 1-oxide and 4,4-dichloro-4-silathiacyclohexane 1-oxide

Second-order Møller–Plesset theory (MP2) and density functional theory (B3LYP) with the 6-311G(d,p) and 6-311+G(d,p) basis sets have been used to calculate the equilibrium geometries and relative energies of the chair, twist, and boat conformations of 4-chloro-4-silathiacyclohexane 1-oxide and 4,4-dichloro-4-silathiacyclohexane 1-oxide. The chair conformers of the axial sulfoxides are lower in energy than the chair conformers of the corresponding equatorial sulfoxides. MP2/6-311+G(d,p) predicted the chair conformer of axial trans-4-chloro-4-silathiacyclohexane 1-oxide (4a) to be 6.12, 0.44, and 0.45 kcal/mol, respectively, more stable than the corresponding 1,4-twist (4b), 2,5-twist (4c) and 1,4-boat (4d) conformers and 6.93 kcal/mol more stable than the 2,5-boat transition state ([4e]‡). Structures 4c and 4d are stabilized by intramolecular coordination of the sulfinyl oxygen with silicon that results in trigonal bipyramidal geometry at silicon. The 1,4-boat conformer (7d) of axial 4,4-dichloro-4-silathiacyclohexane 1-oxide is also stabilized by transannular coordination of the sulfinyl oxygen with silicon. The energy difference (Erel = 4.23 kcal/mol) between the chair conformer (7a) and 7d is larger than that between 4a and 4d. The relatively lower stability of the 1,4-boat conformer (7d) of axial 4,4-dichloro-4-silathiacyclohexane 1-oxide (7a) may be due to repulsive interactions of the axial halogen and sulfinyl oxygen atoms. The relative energies and structures of the conformers and transition states of cis- and trans-4-chloro-4-silathiacyclohexane 1-oxide and 4,4-dichloro-4-silathiacyclohexane 1-oxide are discussed in terms of hyperconjugative interactions, orbital interactions, nonbonded interactions, and intramolecular sulfinyl oxygen–silicon coordination.