| Abstract: | The confromations of the unsaturated seven membered ring in 4,4,6,6-tetradeuterium-1,2-benzocycloheptene-(1) ( 1 ) and five benzocycloheptene derivatives were determined by NMR spectroscopy. For all investigated compounds at ?80°C only one conformer was present in detectable quantity. By analysis of the NMR data – molecular symmetry, coupling constants and chemical shift – it can be shown that the conformation is always the chair form. The free conformational enthalpy of both the other conformations with boat or twist form of the ring is for all six compounds more than 1.8 kcal/mole. The experimental results agree with those from model calculations: thus for benzocycloheptene, the 5,5-dimethyl derivative ( 2 ) and the 4,4,6,6-tetramethyl derivative ( 4 ) the lowest energy was found for the chair conformation; the second most stable conformations were found to be the boat for 1 and 4 , and the twist form for 2 . |
