Comments

cyclopentadiene

Very thorough and very nice analysis. But I think I missed why 4 is lower than 3? You put it down to torsional energy? I think the biggest difference is bending?

Taxol

Again, excellent results. But did you explore in either case, the "alternative chair" which can exist for both 9 and 10? It might have been lower?

Re hyperstability, one way of exploring that is via hydrogenation energies compared to a standard alkene (normally taken as cyclohexene).

NMR

Very nice, particularly the presentation and the bar graph. But I had a look at your final geometry for 18, and it came out boat, as you state. Why did you not try the chair as well? In fact, it is lower in energy!

Epoxides

Crystal structures

You identified the C-O bond lengths, but s little bit more as to why one pair has equal lengths, but the other pair unequal would have been useful. The Jacobsen catalyst again would have benefited from the measurement of some of the short contacts that do occur.

NMR

You spotted the need to average some environments in order to compare with expt! Excellent results!

Rotation

Again, a really nice, concise report, with good discussion.

TS

Nicely done. Do quote differences in TS energies in kJ, not Hartree.

NCI

The green regions are mostly van der Waals dispersion forces, not really hydrogen bonds as such.

QTAIM

Discussion kind of ran out here!

Suggestion

Good find, but in fact its a tetrasubstituted alkene. You should check to see if either of the catalysts used can actually reaction with such an alkene!

Overall excellent. Well done!