Solvation of sulfur-centered cations and anions in acetonitrile

The solvation of substituted phenylsulfenium ions and thiophenoxides in acetonitrile has been analyzed on the basis of experimental and theoretical data. Experimental solvation energies are obtained from previously reported oxidation and reduction potentials of the corresponding arylthiyl radicals in combination with theoretically calculated ionization potentials and electron affinities at the B3LYP/6-31+G(d) level. These calculations provide a consistent set of values in contrast to the data sets obtained in our previous paper (Larsen et al., J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2001, 123, 1723). The extracted solvation data show the expected substituent dependency for both kinds of ions, i.e., the absolute value of the solvation energy decreases as the charge becomes more delocalized. For the thiophenoxides there is good agreement between the experimental solvation energies and solvation energies computed using the polarizable continuum model (PCM). The solvation of the arylsulfenium ions, is much stronger than predicted by the PCM method. This can be attributed to the formation of a strong covalent bond of the Ritter type between the arylsulfenium ion and one molecule of acetonitrile. When this interaction is included in the solvation energy calculations by means of a combined supermolecule and PCM approach the experimental data are reproduced within a few kcal mol(-1). While the energy difference of the singlet and triplet spin states of the arylsulfenium ions is almost negligible in gas phase, the singlet cation is undoubtedly the dominating species in solution, since the triplet cation lacks the ability to form a covalent bond with acetonitrile.