Stability of phenol and thiophenol radical cations – interpretation by comparative quantum chemical approaches

The deprotonation kinetics of phenol-type radical cations, formed via a very efficient electron transfer in the pulse radiolysis of non-polar solutions, for example n-chlorobutane, is governed mainly by electronic effects due to the nature of the phenol substituents, whereas steric effects are of minor importance; thiophenols, which are sulphur analogues of phenols, exhibit a similar behavior. Comparative quantum chemical calculations show that the calculated spin densities at the hetero atoms correlate well with the experimentally determined radical cation lifetimes. Not only the Density Functional Theory (DTF) B3LYP but also the semiempirical quantum chemical model PM3 can be applied for the open shell systems mentioned.