A New Yardstick for Benzenoid Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons

Abstract

The newly introduced signature of benzenoids (a sequence of six real numbers Si with i = 6-1) shows the composition of the pi-electron partition by indicating the number of times all rings of the benzenoid are assigned 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, or 1 pi-electrons. It allows the introduction of a new ordering criterion for such polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons by summing some of the terms in the signature. There is an almost perfect linear correlation between sums S6 + S5 and S4 + S3 for isomeric cata- or peri-fused benzenoids, so that one can sort such isomers according to ascending s 6 + S5 or to descending S4 + S3 sums (the resulting ordering does not differ much and agrees with that based on increasing numbers of Clar sextets and of Kekule structures). Branched cata-condensed benzenoids have higher S6 + S5 sums than isomeric nonbranched systems. For nonisomeric peri-condensed benzenoids, both sums increase with increasing numbers of benzenoid rings and decrease with the number of internal carbon atoms. Other partial sums that have been explored are S6 + S5 + S3 And S6 + S2 + S1, and the last one appears to be more generally applicable as a parameter for the complexity of benzenoids and for ordering isomeric benzenoids.