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Concept
Prelog strain
Summary
In organic chemistry, transannular strain (also called Prelog strain after chemist Vladimir Prelog) is the unfavorable interactions of ring substituents on non-adjacent carbons. These interactions, called transannular interactions, arise from a lack of space in the interior of the ring, which forces substituents into conflict with one another. In medium-sized cycloalkanes, which have between 8 and 11 carbons constituting the ring, transannular strain can be a major source of the overall strain, especially in some conformations, to which there is also contribution from large-angle strain and Pitzer strain. In larger rings, transannular strain drops off until the ring is sufficiently large that it can adopt conformations devoid of any negative interactions.
Transannular strain can also be demonstrated in other cyclo-organic molecules, such as lactones, lactams, ethers, cycloalkenes, and cycloalkynes. These compounds are not without significance, since they are particularly useful in the study of transannular strain. Furthermore, transannular interactions are not relegated to only conflicts between hydrogen atoms, but can also arise from larger, more complicated substituents interacting across a ring.
By definition, strain implies discomfiture, so it should follow that molecules with large amounts of transannular strain should have higher energies than those without. Cyclohexane, for the most part, is without strain and is therefore quite stable and low in energy. Rings smaller than cyclohexane, like cyclopropane and cyclobutane, have significant tension caused by small-angle strain, but there is no transannular strain. While there is no small-angle strain present in medium-sized rings, there does exist something called large-angle strain. Some angle and torsional strain is used by rings with more than nine members to relieve some of the distress caused by transannular strain.
As the plot to the left indicates, the relative energies of cycloalkanes increases as the size of the ring increases, with a peak at cyclononane (with nine members in its ring.
Official source
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