Published in Henry Rzepa's Blog

In the previous post, I referred to a recently published review on hypervalency[cite]10.1039/C5SC02076J[/cite] which introduced a very simple way (the valence electron equivalent γ) of quantifying the effect. Diazomethane was cited as one example of a small molecule exhibiting hypervalency (on nitrogen) by this measure.

References

General Chemistry

A quantitative definition of hypervalency

Published in Chemical Science

The concept of hypervalency has had a long but troubled history. Although several attempts have been made to dispense with the concept altogether, it remains in widespread use. By developing a simple but quantitative measure of hypervalency, the concept can be rehabilitated to provide valuable chemical insights in the context of Lewis models.