The potential of pnicogen bonding for catalysis - a computational study

Pnicogen bonding is a noncovalent interaction between the electrophilic region of a phosphorus atom and a Lewis base. Although this interaction can be comparable in strength to other noncovalent interactions, no systematic application in organic synthesis or catalysis is known so far. To identify the potential of this interaction for organocatalysis, we have now analysed different pnicogen-bond donors as catalysts for the activation of three different model reactions employing density functional theory. Our calculations suggest rate accelerations of several orders of magnitude for all cases indicating that synthetic applications should be feasible. Furthermore, our results indicate that pnicogen-bond donors can be comparable to halogen-bond-based catalysts in these reactions.