Crystallography aided by atomic core-level binding energies: proton transfer versus hydrogen bonding in organic crystal structures.

Ionic bond or hydrogen bridge? Brønsted proton transfer to nitrogen acceptors in organic crystals causes strong N1s core-level binding energy shifts. A study of 15 organic cocrystal and salt systems shows that standard X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) can be used as a complementary method to X-ray crystallography for distinguishing proton transfer from H-bonding in organic condensed matter.