Supercharged cations of benzene

Stable, supercharged benzene ions produced in electron impact ionization have been observed by techniques of collisional mass spectrometry in which single electron transfer reactions of incident C6H6n+* ions at kiloelectronvolt energies give rise to stable C6H6(n-1)+ product ions. Semiempirical SCF-MO calculations employed for the computation of C6H6n+ structures indicate that geometry optimized minimum energy C6H6n+ cyclic ions exhibit a progression of elongation and expansion as n increases. Structural and energetic data have been obtained for the n = 1 to 6 charge states of benzene. © 1985 American Chemical Society.