Baird’s Rule in Substituted Fulvene Derivatives: An Information-Theoretic Study on Triplet-State Aromaticity and Antiaromaticity

Originated from the cyclic delocalization of electrons resulting in extra stability and instability, aromaticity and antiaromaticity are important chemical concepts whose appreciation and quantification are still much of recent interest in the literature. Employing information-theoretic quantities can provide us with more insights and better understanding about them, as we have previously demonstrated. In this work, we examine the triplet-state aromaticity and antiaromaticity, which are governed by Baird’s 4n rule, instead of Hückel’s 4n + 2 rule for the singlet state. To this end, we have made use of 4 different aromaticity indexes and 8 information-theoretic quantities, examined a total of 22 substituted fulvene derivatives, and compared the results both in singlet and triplet states. It is found that cross-correlations of these two categories of molecular property descriptors enable us to better understand the nature and propensity of aromaticity and antiaromaticity for the triplet state. Our results have not only demonstrated the existence and validity of Baird’s rule but also shown that Hückel’s rule and Baird’s rule indeed share the same theoretical foundation because with these cross-correlation patterns we are able to distinguish them from each other simultaneously in both singlet and triplet states. Our results should provide new insights into the nature of aromaticity and antiaromaticity in the triplet state and pave the road toward new ways to quantify this pair of important chemical concepts.