Potential energy
Potential energy surfaces for chemical reactions can be classified as "attractive" or "repulsive" by comparing the extensions of the bond lengths in the activated complex relative to those of the reactants and products. For a reaction of type A + B—C → A—B + C, the bond length extension for the newly formed A—B bond is defined as R*AB = RAB − R0AB, where RAB is the A—B bond length in the transition state and R0AB in the product molecule. Similarly for the bond which is broken in the reaction, R*BC = RBC − R0BC, where R0BC refers to the reactant molecule.