Theoretical studies on quinones I. The structure of p-benzoquinone and two of its excited triplet states

Ab initio calculations on the ground and two excited triplet states (³B_1g and ³B_1u) of p-benzoquinone are described. The geometries of the three states were fully optimised at the SCF level using the 3-21G basis set. For the excited states, both D_2h and C_2v geometries were investigated. Comparison was made between UHF and ROHF levels of theory.     

Quantum-chemical modeling of photoelectron spectra and electronic structure of <Emphasis Type="Italic">tris</Emphasis>-β-diketonates of 3<Emphasis Type="Italic">d</Emphasis>-metals Sc,Ti, V

The electronic structure and ionization energies of chelate complexes were calculated for transition metals Sc, Ti, and V using the Hartree-Fock (HF)SCF ab initio approximations. As the number of d electrons increases in the series of these compounds, the sequence of HF orbitals does not agree any longer with the PES bands and with the data obtained in the density functional theory approximation. Using the configuration interaction (CI) method considerably improves agreement with experiment. For the vanadium complex containing an odd d electron in the ionized state, the HF orbitals become a rough approximation for the CI decomposition, hindering the interpretation of the ionic states.Original Russian Text Copyright © 2004 by V. I. Vovna and I. S. OsmushkoTranslated from Zhurnal Strukturnoi Khimii, Vol. 45, No. 4, pp. 651–659, July–August, 2004.This revised version was published online in April 2005 with a corrected cover date.     

Note on the ab initio PUHF treatment of open-shell systems

Ab initio projected-unrestricted Hartree-Fock calculations have been carried out on a number of excited and ionic states of the water molecule. Results have been compared with large-scale CI calculations, with IVO calculations, and with those of Mrozek and Golebiewski obtained by the 2 × 2 rotation method applied to orbitals. It is concluded that the PUHF method may provide the most useful alternative to large-scale CI for calculating properties of open-shell systems. But it will not be generally useful for calculating spectral transition energies.     

Relative stability of the2 A 1g and2 E g states of the C2H 6 + ion

Anab initio study of the relative stability for the states² A _1g and² E _g of C₂H ₆ ⁺ has been carried out. The results of the Open Shell Restricted Hartree-Fock calculations lead to assign the² A _{1 g} as the ground state of the molecule in agreement with previous SCF calculations.The correlation energy associated to both states has been calculated within the correlation hole model and the results, contrary to those obtained from Configuration Interaction calculations, do not alter qualitatively the conclusions from SCF.     

SCF-Perturbational analysis of thetrans lone pair effect in methylamine and methanol

Thetrans lone pair effect on the C-H bonds in methylamine and methanol has been analysed by means of CNDO/2 SCF perturbation theory using localised orbitals. The lone pair electrons are partially delocalized into the antibonding C-H orbital beingtrans orientated to the lone pair. This finding supports Hamlow's intuitive rationalization of thetrans lone pair effect.     

Oxygen-induced next-nearest neighbour effects on the C1s-levels in polymer XPS-spectra

This letter reports the results of ab initio quantum chemical calculations on the C_1s core levels of model systems for a number of oxygen containing polymers. Conformational effects were studied. SCF calculations have been carried out with STO-3G and 4-31G basis sets, and Koopmans' theorem was applied to obtain the core-level binding energies. To evaluate the performance of the procedure SCF calculations were carried out on polyacrylic acid. The existence of oxygen-induced secondary substituent effects in the XPS-(ESCA-)spectra is discussed. A comparison with semi-empirical CNDO/2 results from Clark and Thomas has been made.     

One electron orbitals intrinsic to the reduced hamiltonian

One electron orbitals are determined from the reduced hamiltonian by a simple one-step diagonalization. These reduced hamiltonian orbitals (RHO's) are uniquely determined and virtual orbitals obtained in this procedure are on a par with filled orbitals. These RHO's appear well suited for CI calculations. Minimum basis set calculations are presented for H₂O and compared with similar SCF studies.     

Valence type vacant orbitals for configuration interaction calculations

A method is proposed to determine the valence type vacant orbitals, which are suitable for CI calculations and for the initial guess orbitals in MC SCF calculations. The method was applied to calculate the ionization energies of series of molecules and to draw the potential energy curves of various states of N₂ and N⁺₂.     

Ab initio calculation of electronic circular dichroism fortrans-cyclooctene using London atomic orbitals

Summary The second-quantization magnetic dipole operator that arises when London atomic orbitals are used as basis functions is derived. In atomic units, the magnetic dipole operator is defined as the negative of the first derivative of the electronic Hamiltonian containing the interaction with the external magnetic field. It is shown that for finite basis sets, the gauge origin dependence of the resulting magnetic dipole operator is analogous to that of the exact operator, and that the derived operator converges to the exact operator in the limit of a complete basis set. It is also demonstrated that the length expression for the rotatory strength in linear response calculations gives gauge-origin-independent results. Sample calculations ontrans-cyclooctene and its fragments are presented. Compared to conventional orbitals, the basis set convergence of the rotatory strengths calculated in the length form using London atomic orbitals is favourable. The rotatory strength calculated fortrans-cyclooctene agrees nicely with the corresponding experimental circular dichroism spectrum, but the spectra for the fragment molecules show little resemblance with that oftrans-cyclooctene.Dedicated to Prof. Jan Linderberg     

Uncontrolled pseudoliving free-radical polymerization of methyl methacrylate in the presence of butyl-<Emphasis Type="Italic">p</Emphasis>-benzoquinones

Polymerization of methyl methacrylate initiated by dicyclohexyl peroxydicarbonate in the presence of tri-n-butylboron and butyl-p-benzoquinone or 2,5-di-tert-butyl-p-benzoquinone occurred with no induction period. The yields and molecular masses of the polymers linearly increased with an increase in the conversion degree, which suggests the free-radical mechanism of “living” chain polymerization. The poly(methyl methacrylate) macrochains of the prepolymers contained sterically hindered aromatic structures with labile C-O bonds. The latter underwent reversible homolytic dissociation to give a growth-inducing radical and sterically hindered aryloxyls. Pseudoliving free-radical polymerization in the presence of the prepolymer (macroinitiator) was studied at 45, 60, and 80 °C. Published in Russian in Izvestiya Akademii Nauk. Seriya Khimicheskaya, No. 6, pp. 1119–1122, June, 2007.     

Application of the MC SCF method to the π → π* excitation energies of ethylene

The MC SCF method is employed to calculate the N → T and N → V π → π^* vertical excitation energies of ethylene. To obtain accurate excitation energies it is found to be necessary to utilize an expanded valence space containing two π and two π^* orbitals. Relatively small MC SCF calculations, allowing at most one-electron excitations from the sigma space, are found to yield excitation energies and spatial extents of the excited states in excellent agreement with the predictions of large multi-reference or iterative-natural-orbital CI calculations. These results show that within an MC SCF framework σ-σ correlation is unimportant for describing the π → π^* processes. We also conclude that the neglect of the effects of unlinked cluster terms in some of the CI calculations may have introduced small, but important, errors in the excitation energies and predictions of the spatial extent of the V state.     

Systematic Sequences of Geometric Relativistic Basis Sets. I:s- and p-Block Elements up to Xe

In this work a scheme for constructing systematic sequences of relativistic SCF basis sets at a reasonable computational cost is presented and applied to atoms of the s- and p-block up to Xe. This scheme, which couples simplex optimization and the use of geometric series given by four-term polynomial expressions for the logarithm of the exponents, allows for the construction of basis sets that exhibit very regular patterns of convergence to the numerical reference values of atomic total energies, spinor energies and radial expectation values. This regularity, together with the broad range of basis set sizes presented, enables these sets to be used as building blocks for basis sets applicable in both routine and benchmark relativistic calculations on atomic and molecular systems.Electronic Supplementary Material Supplementary material is available for this article at and is accessible for authorized users.     

An ab initio method for approximation of the frozen molecular fragment

An ab initio method for calculation on many-electron molecular systems with the approximation of the inactive part of a molecule by frozen molecular fragment is presented. In the following method the SCF calculations are performed in two series. First the molecular orbitals resulting from the first SCF calculation (modest basis set) are localized. In the second SCF run, the basis set is extended for the active part of the molecule, while molecular orbitals of the inactive part, selected from the localized set, are kept frozen. The results are in good agreement with the extended basis set calculation.     

AB initio SCF study of the electronic structure and spectrum of CuF2

MC SCF and contracted CI calculations have been performed for the three ligand-field states of CuF₂ and also for two charge-transfer states. With the most extensive basis set the calculated d-d transition energies, including a Davidson correctior for cluster effects, are 4150 cm^?1 (²11g) and 10560 cm^?1 (²Δg). These calculations were made with 98 basis functions, including of orbitals on Cu and d orbitals on F. To check the charge distribution in the molecule, calculations of the ESR g factors were also made at the SCF and CI levels of approximation. Resulting CI values are g_| = 1.93 (1.91) and g₁ = 2.76 (2.60). with corresponding experimental numbers in parentheses.     

The ground-state potential curve for F2

The ground-state potential curve for F₂ has been obtained using large-scale MC SCF and CI methods. MC SCF curves were obtained with the CAS SCF method using a variety of sets of active orbitals. The main conclusion from the CAS SCF calculations is that the 2π_u orbital is important. CI curves were obtained using the contracted CI method. The largest calculations contained 312000 configurations proper spin and space (d_2h) symmetry. The main conclusions from the CI calculations are that the configuration XXX are important, otherwise errors in D_e of 0.3 eV and in r_e of 0.02 Å are found. The remaining errors at the CI level are 0.08 eV for D_e, 0.005 Å for r_e and less than 10 cm^?1 for the lowest vibrational levels.     

Ab initio Calculations of the potential energy surface of the reaction of singlet methylene with the hydrogen molecule

The potential energy surface for the insertion of singlet methylene into H₂ has been computed on theab initio SCF level as well as with inclusion of electron correlation by means of the CEPA method. The results are compared with those of previous semiempirical,ab initio SCF and CI calculations. The system is a prototype of a reaction where an allowed and a symmetry-forbidden path can compete. The electron correlation energy was found to be very different for different regions of the surface, but did not have much influence on the optimum reaction path. From the computed heat of the reaction, the heat of formation of singlet methylene was estimated to be 101.5 kcal/mol. According to the calculations the reaction does not need any activation energy.     

Orbital relaxation in the Rydberg series of the lithium atom. An excited state SCF calculation

Self-consistent-field (SCF ) calculations for a series of Rydberg states (1s²ns)²S of the Li atom are performed using the generalized Brillouin theorem (GBT) method. The calculated energy is a proper upper bound to the excited state energy. The SCF term values of the Rydberg states are almost the same as those of the frozen-core approximation ones. The orbital behavior shows that the core is slightly expanded by the penetration of the Rydberg orbitals, and the higher Rydberg orbitals can be very well represented by the modified hydrogen-like orbitals.     

SCF MO CI perturbation calculations of inner shell and valence shell vertical ionization potentials

A CI method for calculating inner and valence shell vertical ionization potentials is presented. It is based on ab initio SCF MO calculations for the neutral closedshell ground state followed by CI perturbation calculations for the ground and ion states including all spin and symmetry adapted singly and doubly excited configurations with respect to the main configurations of the state of interest. The state energy is computed by performing a CI calculation for a set of selected configurations, and then adding the contributions of the remaining configurations as estimated by second order Brillouin-Wigner perturbation theory. The use of the same set of MO's for all states together with the CI perturbation method makes the method rather rapid. The numerical results are, in spite of the limited Gaussian basis sets used, in good agreement with experiment.     

Ab initio calculations ofp-Cl2C6H4 molecule and its35Cl NQR parameters

Ab initio calculations ofp-dichlorobenzene molecule were carried out using the Hartree-Fock method in the 6–31 G* valence-split basis set. The molecule was also calculated by the MNDO method in the valence sp-basis set for comparison. The populations of the valent p-orbitals of the C and CI atoms were analyzed. The optimized geometry of the molecule as well as its³⁵Cl NQR frequency and the asymmetry parameter of the electric field gradient at the³⁵CI nuclei calculated using the populations of the less diffuse components of the valent p-orbitals of the Cl atoms are in agreement with the corresponding experimental values for the -modification of 1,4-Cl₂C₆H₄.Translated fromIzvestiya Akademii Nauk. Seriya Khimicheskaya, No. 9, pp. 2177–2179, September, 1996.     

Reactions of poly(methyl methacrylate) radicals with some <Emphasis Type="Italic">p</Emphasis>-quinones in the presence of tri-<Emphasis Type="Italic">n</Emphasis>-butylboron in methyl methacrylate polymerization

The polymerization of methyl methacrylate initiated by dicyclohexyl peroxydicarbonate at 30 °C was studied in the presence of tri-n-butylboron and a series of quinones, namely, p-benzoquinone, chloranil, and 2,5-di-tert-butyl-p-benzoquinone, whose concentration changed from 0.25 to 2.00 mol.%. The initial polymerization rate and molecular weight of poly(methyl methacrylate) depend on the structure and concentration of quinone. The growth radicals react with p-benzoquinone and chloranil predominantly at the C=C bond, while they react at the C=O bond of 2,5-di-tert-butyl-p-benzoquinone. The terminal stable oxygen-centered radicals that formed react with alkylborane, terminating reaction chains and generating alkyl radicals into the bulk. The latter are involved in chain initiation.__________Published in Russian in Izvestiya Akademii Nauk. Seriya Khimicheskaya, No. 10, pp. 2114–2119, October, 2004.