Protonation as a driving force for pentacoordination of phosphorus

CNDO/2 calculations are reported on four caged phosphorus compounds, Y-P(OCH2CH2)3X (X = N, CH; Y = O, OH+, H+). Structures with and without a transannular bond between P and X were taken into account; the influence of this bond on the stability of the compounds was examined. For X = N and Y = H+ the lowest-energy structure corresponds with the geometry found by X-ray analysis. If X = CH, formation of a transannular bond proves to be unlikely, as expected. The calculations predict the formation of a P-N bond upon protonation of the phosphate (X = N, Y = O). The net atomic charges in the protonated phosphite were used to calculate its NMR coupling constant, 1JPH, which correlates well with the value found experimentally