Enumeration of the isomers of phenylenes

Antiaromaticity in nonbenzenoid oligoarenes and ladder polymers

Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) and fully-conjugated ladder polymers are leading candidates for organics electronics, as their inherent conformational rigidity encourages electron delocalization. Many of these systems consist of fused benzenoid or heterocyclic aromatic rings. Less frequently, however, PAHs are reported with character that alternates between the aromaticity of benzene fragments and the antiaromaticity of a nonbenzenoid moiety. This chapter will focus on recent work published on the theory, synthesis, and properties of two such systems: [N]phenylenes containing 4π-electron cyclobutadienoid character, and diaryl[a,e]pentalenes containing 8π-electron pentalenoid character.

Polynomial expressions for the hyper-Wiener index of extended hydrocarbon networks

General expressions are derived for the hyper-Wiener index (WW) for several series of hydrocarbons, both benzenoid and non-benzenoid, including some two-dimensional networks. Indeed, such expressions were found for all but one series studied. Methods are also described for eliminating the register overflow problem that besets computer-based approaches to calculating WW for large structures by means of the distance matrix.