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As postulated by Fowler and Ugalde [J. Phys. Chem. A 2000, 104, 397], the lowest-energy B13+ isomer proved to be highly aromatic. The topological resonance energy of this cationic boron cluster is positive in sign and very large in magnitude. This constitutes the definitive reason B13+ is kinetically stable and planar or quasiplanar in geometry. The electron-deficient and multivalent character of boron is responsible for the high aromaticity of this cluster. In addition, its minimum bond resonance energy is not too small.
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Jun‐ichi Aihara (2001) studied this question.
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