Tautomeric conversion, vibrational spectra, and density functional studies on peripheral sulfur derivatives of benzothiazole and benzothiazoline isomers

• Mechanism of intramolecular and intermolecular tautomerism.
• Conformational stability.
• The room temperature experimental IR and Raman spectra.
• DFT calculations to investigate structures and vibrational spectra.

The room temperature structural (tautomerism, dimerization, conformational preference, geometry parameters) and vibrational spectral (IR and Raman) analyses have been performed on benzothiazoline (benzothiazoline-2-thione, 3-methyl-benzothiazoline-2-thione) and benzothiazole [2-mercaptobenzothiazole, 2-methylthiobenzothiazole, and bis(benzothiazole-2-ylthio)ethane] derivatives at the B3LYP/6-311++G∗∗ level of theory. Although the keto to enol transition barriers are too high over the most stable benzothiazoline isomers, vibrational spectral analyses reveal some major bands of benzothiazole isomers in the present room temperature experimental FT-IR and FT-Raman specta. Therefore, benzothiazole isomers exist at rare amounts in the powdered samples that are mainly composed of benzothiazoline isomers. The benzothiazole isomers have two stable conformations due to the orientation of their SH and SCH3 moieties. The energetic and vibrational spectral analyses suggest that the benzothiazoline-2-thione molecules can be stabilized further through the NH⋯S intermolecular hydrogen bonds in solid phase. All observed fundamental vibrational bands of the molecules have been assigned based on the calculated mode frequencies and IR/Raman intensities. The mode assignments have been expressed in terms of internal coordinates and their percent potential energy distributions. The effects of substitution at the nitrogen and peripheral sulfur atoms have been analyzed for the geometries and vibrational bands of the molecules.

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