Bowl-to-bowl inversion is one of the characteristic behaviors for some flexible open-end molecular bowls consisting of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons with benzene rings fused by imbedded five-membered rings (π bowls). This intriguing dynamics was studied with sumanene, which is the smallest C 3v symmetric fragment of fullerenes. In this article, our ongoing research on the bowl-to-bowl inversion of sumanene, its benzylic anion species, hexasubstituted derivatives, mononaphthosumanene, and [CpRu( η 6 -sumenene)] + complex is summarized. Estimation based on density functional theory (DFT) calculation is also described.
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Amaya et al. (2012) studied this question.