No abstract

Although aromatic compounds occupy a central position in organic chemistry, antiaromatic compounds have demonstrated little practical utility. Herein we report the application of an antiaromatic compound as an electrode-active material in rechargeable batteries. The performance of dimesityl-substituted norcorrole nickel(II) complex (NiNC) as a cathode-active material was examined with a Li metal anode. A maximum discharge capacity of about 207 mAhg(-1) was maintained after 100 charge/discharge cycles. Moreover, the bipolar redox property of NiNC enables the construction of a Li metal free rechargeable battery. The high performance of NiNC batteries demonstrates a prospective feature of stable antiaromatic compounds as electrode-active materials.

N-fused pentaphyrins (NFP5), stable forms of meso-aryl pentaphyrins, are interesting platforms to realize Hückel aromaticity, nonaromaticity, and Möbius aromaticity depending upon the number of π-electrons, meso-substituent, and metalation. Remarkably, Rh(I) complex of pentakis(pentafluorophenyl) substituted [24]NFP5 has been characterized as a Möbius aromatic macrocycle by the crystal structure, 1H NMR spectrum, NICS calculation, and two-photon absorption (TPA) cross section. This system is, to the best of our knowledge, the smallest Möbius aromatic molecule with a distinct diatropic ring current characterized so far. This work demonstrates the great potential of our synthetic strategy toward Möbius aromatic molecules as well as the possible use of TPA value as a quantitative measure of aromaticity.

Aromaticity is a fundamental concept in chemistry. It is described by Hückel’s rule that states that a cyclic planar π-system is aromatic when it shares 4n+2 π-electrons and antiaromatic when it possesses 4n π-electrons. Antiaromatic compounds are predicted to exhibit remarkable charge transport properties and high redox activities. However, it has so far only been possible to measure compounds with reduced aromaticity but not antiaromatic species due to their energetic instability. Here, we address these issues by investigating the single-molecule charge transport properties of a genuinely antiaromatic compound, showing that antiaromaticity results in an order of magnitude increase in conductance compared with the aromatic counterpart. Single-molecule current–voltage measurements and ab initio transport calculations reveal that this results from a reduced energy gap and a frontier molecular resonance closer to the Fermi level in the antiaromatic species. The conductance of the antiaromatic complex is further modulated electrochemically, demonstrating its potential as a high-conductance transistor.