Trimethyltrioxane (Paraldehyde) and Its Halomethanes Complexes: Crystallization, Structures, and Analysis of Packing Motifs

Crystals of molecular complexes of trimethyltrioxane (TMT) with chloroform (CF), bromoform (BF), dichloromethane (DCM), and dibromomethane (DBM) as well as those of pure TMT were grown in situ and characterized by single crystal X-ray crystallography. The CF and BF complexes, as well as those of DCM and DBM, are isostructural. The packing motifs were examined using the vector analysis of pairwise energies of intermolecular interactions. The method shows some deficiencies of the traditional approach based on the analysis of geometrical parameters of short intermolecular contacts.