The chemistries of a monoradical of the ultrafast "radical-clock" type and a structurally related singlet biradical, generated by Norrish type II photochemistry, are compared. The monoradical is found to undergo the characteristic ring-opening reaction of its class at about 10(10) s(-1) at room temperature. However, the singlet biradical shows no evidence of the analogous ring-opening reaction. The contrasting chemistry is traced not to a fundamental difference in electronic structure of the two intermediates, but rather to a steric interaction that the biradical alone would have to suffer during the ring opening. Although the magnitude of the steric hindrance is small (estimated 15-20 kJ mol(-1)), it is enough to shut down the reaction, because the biradical has other facile product-forming reactions available.
Reaction of the beta-styryl radical with O2 in benzene results in a low yield of benzene oxide, which is shown by isotopic labeling to arise from the solvent. Ab initio and DFT calculations elucidate the mechanism of this reaction, and identify the properties of other radicals that should be more effective promoters of the reaction. The CN radical is found to be one candidate.
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