ERROR 1
ERROR 1
ERROR 2
ERROR 2
ERROR 2
ERROR 2
ERROR 2
Password and Confirm password must match.
If you have an ACS member number, please enter it here so we can link this account to your membership. (optional)
ERROR 2
ACS values your privacy. By submitting your information, you are gaining access to C&EN and subscribing to our weekly newsletter. We use the information you provide to make your reading experience better, and we will never sell your data to third party members.
Chemists at MIT have created a stable aromatic anion composed solely of pnictogens—the elements that make up the periodic table column to the right of carbon (Science 2015, DOI: 10.1126/science.aab0204). Christopher C. Cummins and Alexandra Velian made the inorganic aromatic ring, which has the formula P2N3–, by transferring diphosphorus to the azide anion using a sodium cryptand cation. They crystallized a complex of the resulting salt and determined that the anion is planar and has an aromatic π-electron system, as indicated by electron structure calculations. Until now, the chemists note, to isolate compounds with multiple bonds between pairs of phosphorus atoms, chemists had to use bulky substituents to block the reactive π bond. But no such bulky groups were needed to isolate P2N3–. “This stabilization is best construed as aromaticity,” Cummins and Velian point out, “an effect traditionally reserved for the domain of organic chemistry.”
Join the conversation
Contact the reporter
Submit a Letter to the Editor for publication
Engage with us on X