Conformations and inversion pathways leading to racemization of all the tautomers of gossypol, gossypolone, anhydrogossypol, and a diethylamine Schiff's base of gossypol were investigated with MM3(2000). All forms have hindered rotation because of clashes between the methyl carbon atom and oxygen-containing moieties ortho to the bond linking the two naphthalene rings. Inversion energies generally agree with available experimental data. Gossypol preferentially inverts in its dihemiacetal tautomeric form through the cis pathway (where similar groups clash). Gossypolone inverts more easily than gossypol, and preferentially through the trans pathway (where dissimilar groups clash) when one of its outer rings has an enol-keto group and the other has an aldehyde group. Anhydrogossypol racemizes through the cis pathway. The bridge bond and the ortho exo-cyclic bonds in all the structures bend from planarity, and the inner naphthalene rings pucker to accommodate the inversion. For gossypol, the transition is achieved through greater bending of the exo-cyclic bonds (up to 12°) and less distortion of the inner benzyl rings (q≤0.34 Å), (up to 12.7°) . For gossypolone the transition occurs with greater distortion of the inner benzyl rings (q≤0.63 Å) and less out-of-plane bending (up to 8.4°). By isolating individual clashes, their contribution to the overall barrier can be analyzed, as shown for the dialdehyde tautomer of gossypol.

Extensive variations of the ring structures of three deoxyaldohexopyranoses, l-fucose, d-quinovose, and l-rhamnose, and four dideoxyaldohexopyranoses, d-digitoxose, abequose, paratose, and tyvelose, were studied by energy minimization with the molecular mechanics algorithm MM3(92). Chair conformers, ⁴C₁ ind-quinovose and the equivalent ¹C₄ in l-fucose and l-rhamnose, overwhelmingly dominate in the three deoxyhexoses; in the d-dideoxyhexoses, ⁴C₁ is again dominant, but with increased amounts of ¹C₄ forms in the α anomers of the three 3,6-dideoxyhexoses, abequose, paratose, and tyvelose and in both α and β anomers of the 2,6-dideoxyhexose d-digitoxose. In general, modeled proton–proton coupling constants agreed well with experimental values. Computed anomeric ratios strongly favor the β configuration except ford-digitoxose, which is almost equally divided between α and β configurations, and l-rhamnose, where the β configuration is somewhat favored. MM3(92) appears to overstate the prevalence of the equatorial β anomer in all three deoxyhexoses, as earlier found with fully oxygenated aldohexopyranoses.