PES Butane

We saw that butane has a few important extreme conformations:  Anti, Gauche, Me/Me eclipsed and Me/H eclipsed.  Lets explore the potential enegry surface (PES) of rotation around teh C2-C3 bond of butane.

Action
  • Click on a point at the higest peak on the PES surface.  This is the Me/Me eclipsed conformation.  It is the higest in energy (least stable) conformation of butane.
  • Click on a point in one of the two vallies.  This is the Gauche conformation.

 


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Click on a point, or scan along the baseline to move rapidly among the models.