Revisiting the Structure and Bonding in Li₅H₆^- and the Exploration of Reactivity: Planar Pentacoordinate Hydrogen

Recently, Guha and co-workers (Sarmah, K.; Kalita, A.; Purkayastha, S.; Guha, A. K. Pushing The Extreme of Multicentre Bonding: Planar Pentacoordinate Hydride. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2024, e202318741) reported a highly intriguing bonding motif: planar pentacoordinate hydrogen (ppH) in Li₅H₆^-, featuring C_2v symmetry in the singlet state with two distinct H-Li (center-ring) bond distances. We herein revisited the potential energy surface of Li₅H₆^- by using a target-oriented genetic algorithm. Our investigation revealed that the lowest-energy structure of Li₅H₆^- exhibits a ppH configuration with very high D_5h symmetry and a ¹A₁′ electronic state. We did not find any electronic effect like Jahn-Teller distortion that could be responsible for lowering its symmetry. Moreover, our calculations demonstrated significant differences in the relative energies of other low-lying isomers. An energetically very competitive planar tetracoordinate hydrogen (ptH) isomer is also located, but it corresponds to a very shallow minimum on the potential energy surface depending on the used level of theory. Chemical bonding analyses, including AdNDP and EDA-NOCV, uncover that the optimal Lewis structure for Li₅H₆^- involves H^- ions stabilized by the Li₅H₅ crown. Surprisingly, despite the dominance of electrostatic interactions, the contribution from covalent bonding is also significant between ppH and the Li₅H₅ moiety, derived from H^-(1s) → Li₅H₅ σ donation. Magnetically induced current density analysis revealed that due to minimal orbital overlap and the highly polar nature of the H-Li covalent interaction, the ppH exhibits local diatropic ring currents around the H centers, which fails to result in a global aromatic ring current. The coordination of Li₅H₆^- with Lewis acids, BH₃ and BMe₃, instantly converts the ppH configuration to (quasi) ptH. These Lewis acid-bound ptH complexes show high electronic stability and high thermochemical stability against dissociation and, therefore, will be ideal candidates for the experimental realization.