Quantum chemical study of allyl halides

Using the MNDO method we have shown that the bathochromic shift of the longwavelength region of absorption in the electronic spectrum of allyl bromide and allyl iodide on going to nonplanar conformers is due to the fact that, in this case, the transition ^* to the low-lying ^* orbital appears, which is forbidden in planar forms. In allyl fluoride and allyl chloride, , and the transition ^*, which depends little on conformation, is long-wavelength. In the gauche conformers of allyl halides, the frontier MOs are appreciably delocalized as a result of - interaction; in the s-trans conformer, the unshared pair of the heteroatom makes an insignificant contribution to the orbital only in allyl iodide.Translated from Izvestiya Akademii Nauk SSSR, Seriya Khimicheskaya, No. 11, pp. 2552–2557, November, 1989.