PNNL

Abstract

Metals and organic molecules are at the opposite sides in chemistry. Thus one may think that chemical bonding models, such as aromaticity, developed in organic chemistry will not be applicable in systems involving metallic elements. Yet in recent years there have been significant advances in extending the aromaticity and antiaromaticity concepts into the realm of metal clusters and alloys. These new developments have shown that aromaticity and antiaromaticity in metal systems have frequently multiple nature, being o-aromatic/antiaromatic and n-aromatic/antiaromatic, which is not found in organic aromatic/antiaromatic molecules.