Thermodynamic, Energetic, and Topological Properties of Crystal Packing of Pyrazolo[1,5-a] Pyrimidines Governed by Weak Electrostatic Intermolecular Interactions

A series of pyrazolo[1,5-a] pyrimidines was used as a molecular model in order to understand the crystal packing of compounds with weak electrostatic intermolecular interactions. Additionally, the relationship between the energetic content of intermolecular interactions, the contact surfaces of molecules, and the thermodynamic properties of the crystal was established. The approach, which is based on a supramolecular cluster, shows that for compounds with weak electrostatic intermolecular interactions, the energetic content of the interactions is associated with a large contact surface. The crystal packing of the studied compounds is mainly governed by interactions that involve high interaction energy over a large contact surface. These results show that pi center dot center dot center dot pi interaction may be as responsible as other strong interactions for driving the crystal packing of compounds with weak electrostatic intermolecular interactions. Furthermore, the correlation between sublimation enthalpy and cluster energy showed that the theoretical calculation of cluster energy provided the real energetic content of crystal lattice energy and confirmed that the first coordination sphere (the supramolecular cluster) is the smallest portion of the crystal that represents all the information necessary for understanding the intermolecular interactions over the entire crystal.