The Phenyl Effect in Distortion Polarization

Diphenylmercury has been used as a model to show that the electron and atom parts of the distortion polarization cannot reliably be evaluated by optical methods. The measured electron polarization extrapolated to infinite wavelength is larger than the combined electron and atom polarization measured at radio frequency. The difference has been defined as the "phenyl effect" and has been attributed to the mobility at radio frequencies of electrons in the resonance-hybridized orbitals of the aromatic nucleus. It has been suggested that the effect is general for aromatic compounds.