Local reactivity difference index

Theoretical models provide interesting alternatives to evaluate intrinsic electronic substituent effects. This can be done for instance by means of the response functions defined as global or local reactivity indices. The variations of a reactivity index for a set of functional groups attached to a common molecular frame may also be taken as a measure of the influence that the different substituents may have on the reactivity pattern of molecules. 

In this sense, other authors propose a general hypothesis that any in vitro or in vivo biological activity can be explained only in terms of local reactivity indexes and tested for the inhibition cell growth by several 1-azabenzanthrone derivatives. In all of them, good structure -activity relationships have been obtained and some requirements for potent biological activity. This methodology to understand the whole process and, in the case of multi-step processes, is unable to relate the different reactivity indexes appearing in the SAR equations to any particular step [28]. 

Useful information about polarity of de DA processes may be obtained from the difference in the global electrophilicity power of the reactants. This difference has been proposed as a measure of the polar character of the reaction. On the other hand, local reactivity indexes are associated with site selectivity in a chemical reaction. These descriptors should reflect the sites in a molecule where the reactivity pattern stated by the global quantities should take place. For instance, an important local reactivity parameter was introduced by Parr et al., and it was defined as the Fukui fimction (Domingo, et al, 2002)... 

Evaluation of the only appropriate Fukui function is required for investigating an intramolecular reaction, as local softness is merely scaling of Fukui function (as shown in Equation 12.7), and does not alter the intramolecular reactivity trend. For this type, one needs to evaluate the proper Fukui functions (/+ or / ) for the different potential sites of the substrate. For example, the Fukui function values for the C and O atoms of H2CO, shown above, predicts that O atom should be the preferred site for an electrophilic attack, whereas C atom will be open to a nucleophilic attack. Atomic Fukui function for electrophilic attack (fc ) for the ring carbon atoms has been used to study the directing ability of substituents in electrophilic substitution reaction of monosubstituted benzene [23]. In some cases, it was shown that relative electrophilicity (f+/f ) or nucleophilicity (/ /f+) indices provide better intramolecular reactivity trend [23]. For example, basicity of substituted anilines could be explained successfully using relative nucleophilicity index ( / /f 1) [23]. Note however that these parameters are not able to differentiate the preferred site of protonation in benzene derivatives, determined from the absolute proton affinities [24],... 

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