Crossed Molecular Beam Study on the Ground State Reaction of Atomic Boron [B(2Pj)] with Hydrogen Cyanide [HCN(X1Σ+)

Abstract

The linear boronisocyanide species, [BNC(X(1)Sigma(+))], represents the simplest triatomic molecule with three distinct, neighboring main group atoms of the second row of the periodic table of the elements: boron, carbon, and nitrogen. This makes boronisocyanide a crucial benchmark system to understand the chemical bonding and the electronic structure of small molecules, in particular when compared to the isoelectronic tricarbon molecule, [CCC(X(1)Sigma(g)(+))]. However, a clean, directed synthesis of boronisocyanide-a crucial prerequisite to study the properties of this molecule-has remained elusive so far. Here, we combine crossed molecular beam experiments of ground state boron atoms ((2)P(j)) with hydrogen cyanide with electronic structure calculations and reveal that the boronisocyanide molecule, [BNC(X(1)Sigma(+))], is formed as the exclusive product under gas phase single collision conditions. We also show that higher energy isomers such as the hitherto unnoticed, ring-strained cyclic BNC(X(3)A') structure, which is isoelectronic to the triplet, cyclic tricarbon molecule, [C(3)(X(3)A(2)')], do exist as local minima. Our studies present the first directed synthesis and observation of gas phase boronisocyanide providing a doorway for further fundamental studies on one of the simplest triatomic molecules composed solely of group III-V elements.