4-(Methylsulfonyl)benzaldehyde

In the crystal of the title compound, C8H8O3S, the molecules are linked into a three-dimensional array by intermolecular C—H⋯O hydrogen bonds.

In the crystal of the title compound, C 8 H 8 O 3 S, the molecules are linked into a three-dimensional array by intermolecular C-HÁ Á ÁO hydrogen bonds.
Experimental Crystal data

Comment
The title compound has been of great of interest for many years. It acts as an important precursor for the synthesis of amino alcohols with applications to the synthesis of the antibiotics chloramphenicol, fluoramphenicol and thiamphenicol. Here we report its crystal structure.
In the title compound ( Fig. 1), all bond lengths are within normal ranges (Allen et al., 1987) and comparable to the values observed in a closely related compound (Ma, 2008). The C1-S-C2-C3 torsion angle is 75.07 (17)°.
In the crystal structure, molecules are linked through intermolecular C-H···O hydrogen bonds (Table 1; Fig. 2).

Experimental
The title compound was synthesized according to a literature method (Rivett et al., 1979). 0.1 g of the title compound was dissolved in acetonitrile (20 ml). Single crystals suitable for X-ray diffraction were obtained by spontaneous evaporation of the solvent.

Refinement
All H atoms were placed in geometrical positions and constrained to ride on their parent atoms with C-H distances in the range 0.93-0.96 Å, They were treated as riding atoms, with U iso (H) = kU eq (C), where k = 1.5 for methyl and 1.2 for all other H atoms. Fig. 1. The molecular structure of the title compound, showing the atom-labelling scheme. Displacement ellipsoids are drawn at the 35% probability level. Hydrogen atoms are shown as small spheres of arbitrary radius.

Special details
Geometry. All esds (except the esd in the dihedral angle between two l.s. planes) are estimated using the full covariance matrix. The cell esds are taken into account individually in the estimation of esds in distances, angles and torsion angles; correlations between esds in cell parameters are only used when they are defined by crystal symmetry. An approximate (isotropic) treatment of cell esds is used for estimating esds involving l.s. planes.
Refinement. Refinement of F 2 against ALL reflections. The weighted R-factor wR and goodness of fit S are based on F 2 , conventional R-factors R are based on F, with F set to zero for negative F 2 . The threshold expression of F 2 > 2sigma(F 2 ) is used only for calculating R-factors(gt) etc. and is not relevant to the choice of reflections for refinement. R-factors based on F 2 are statistically about twice as large as those based on F, and R-factors based on ALL data will be even larger.

Fractional atomic coordinates and isotropic or equivalent isotropic displacement parameters (Å 2 )
x y z U iso */U eq S 0.25890 (8)