The fast disappearance of hydroxycarbene through hydrogen tunnelling – or is it really tunnelling?

In 2008, the previously elusive hydroxycarbene, H-C-OH was finally reported as having been captured by matrix isolation, accompanied by the observation that "we unexpectedly find that H–C–OH rearranges to formaldehyde with a half-life of only 2h at 11K by pure hydrogen tunnelling through a large energy barrier in excess of 30 kcal mol–1. A subsequent theoretical study of […]