ABSTRACT
Oxygen-17 nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy is rapidly assuming a prominent role as a pivotal tool for accessing useful information in evaluating the importance of bonding and structural characteristics of organosulfur and organophosphorus compounds. Oxygen-17 nuclear shieldings in organosulfur and organophosphorus compounds are probably best understood from the results of early LCAO-MO treatments of NMR shifts that stress the additive importance of the local diamagnetic and paramagnetic. What factors control the O NMR shifts in these systems are a matter of considerable speculation, but it seems certain that S-S multiple bonding, extended conjugative interactions between the sulfenyl sulfur and the sulfinyl group, and polarization effects between sulfenyl sulfur and the sulfinyl oxygen may have unique importance. Finally, it is noteworthy that the conformational chair interchange between the axial and equatorial sulfinyl groups of thiane 1-oxide afford a time-averaged O NMR shift.
