An examination of the extent of quinhydrone formation between hydroquinone and p-benzoquinone in 20 dvferent pure and aqueous solvents indicated a reasonable correlation between extent of quinhydrone formation, as judged by the magnitude of the association constant and of the related standard free energy, and the surface tension (surface free energy) of the solvent. This supported the hypothesis of Sinanoglu and Abdulnur that the driving force of "hydrophobic bonding," e.g., in D N A double helix formation, is the decrease in free energy as the total area of solvent cage about the two dissociated entities is decreased in the process of complex formation. Thus the surface of contact between hydroquinone and quinone with solvent is decreased by the order of 20 A. in quinhydrone formation. The energy change f o r water or a high surface tension solvent is large enough to drive complex formation in these solvents as compared with, e.g., tetrahydrofuran, glacial acetic acid, methanol, and n-butyl alcohol.
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