The conjugation of 1,3-butadiene was first evaluated by Kistiakowsky, a conjugative contribution of 3.5 kcal/mol was found based on the energetic comparison of hydrogenation between conjugated species and unconjugated analogues. Rogers who used the method first applied by Kistiakowsky, reported that the conjugation stabilization of 1,3-butadiyne was zero, as the difference of ΔH between first and second hydrogenation was zero. The heats of hydrogenation (ΔH) were obtained by computational G3(MP2) quantum chemistry method.
Another group led by Houk suggested the methods employed by Rogers and Kistiakowsky was inappropriate, because that comparisons of heats of hydrogenation evaluate not only conjugation effects but also other structural and electronic differences. They obtained -70.6 kcal/mol and -70.4 kcal/mol for the first and second hydrogenation respectively by ab initio calculation, which confirmed Rogers’ data. However, they interpreted the data differently by taking into account the hyperconjugation stabilization. To quantify hyperconjugation effect, they designed the following isodesmic reactions in 1-butyne and 1-butene.
Deleting the hyperconjugative interactions gives virtual states that have energies that are 4.9 and 2.4 kcal/mol higher than those of 1-butyne and 1-butene, respectively. Employment of these virtual states results in a 9.6 kcal/mol conjugative stabilization for 1,3-butadiyne and 8.5 kcal/mol for 1,3-butadiene.