This article offers a comprehensive theoretical framework for proton crane-based molecular switches, but a few aspects left me wondering:
The use of solvents like toluene and acetonitrile provides useful insights into tautomer stability and switching efficiency. However, could the authors elaborate on how these findings translate to real-world scenarios where environmental factors or different solvent polarities might come into play?
HQBT serves as an excellent benchmark, but the article hints at the experimental potential of HQ3iQ, HQPm, and HQPy′. Are there any plans to explore their experimental synthesis or investigate the feasibility of validating these theoretical predictions?
The role of aromaticity in stabilizing the K and KK states is highlighted, but could the authors provide more quantitative metrics or comparisons to existing aromatic systems? This might offer additional clarity on its contribution to the efficiency of the switching mechanism.