Hydrogen bonding in electronically excited states of molecules

Theoretical Chemistry Accounts - CNDO/2 calculations show that hydrogen bonds in the electronically excited states of +H2O and +HOCH3 systems are slightly weaker than in the ground states. The...     

Multi-reference state-universal coupled-cluster approaches to electronically excited states

The multi-reference (MR), general model space (GMS), state-universal (SU), coupled-cluster (CC) method with singles and doubles (GMS-SU-CCSD), as well as its triple-corrected versions GMS-SU-CCSD(T), are employed to assess their ability to describe low-lying excited states of various molecules, with an emphasis on a simultaneous handling of several states of the same symmetry species. A special attention is given to the role of the so-called C-conditions that account for non-vanishing internal cluster amplitudes when relying on an incomplete GMS, as well as to the choice of suitable model spaces and a perturbative account of secondary triples. The ambiguities arising when using large basis sets are also pointed out. To achieve a general assessment of the potential of the GMS-type SU-CC approaches, the vertical excitation energies of several species, including the challenging BN diatomic as well as larger systems, namely formaldehyde, trans-butadiene, formamide, and benzene are considered. These results are compared with those provided by the equation-of-motion EOM-CCSD method and, whenever available, the density functional theory results and experimental data. These comparisons clearly demonstrate the usefulness of GMS-type MR-CC approaches.     

Theoretical investigation of the electronically excited states of chlorine hydrate

As a step toward a first principles characterization of the optical properties of chlorine hydrate, we have calculated the electronic absorption spectrum of a chlorine molecule trapped in dodecahedral (H2O)20 and hexakaidodecahedral (H2O)24 cages. For comparison, spectra were also calculated for an isolated Cl2 molecule as well as for selected Cl2(H2O)n, n < or =8, clusters cut out of the Cl2(H2O)20 cluster, allowing us to follow the evolution of the low-lying excited states with increasing number of surrounding water molecules. Although encapsulation of a chlorine molecule within the water cages has relatively little effect on its low-lying valence transitions, it does result in a large number of solvent-to-solute charge-transfer transitions at energies starting near 48,000 cm(-1).     

The role of electronically excited states in recombination reactions

Methods are described for including the participation of bound electronically excited states in calculations on radical recombination reactions. These methods are illustrated by applying them to the reactions For O₂, accurate ab initio potentials are used in calculations which show that the electronic degeneracy and long-range part of the potential are likely to be crucial in determining the contribution of a given electronic state to the overall reaction, as long as the state is not so weakly bound that it dissociates thermally before being electronically quenched. Weak collision effects are allowed for using a Monte Carlo technique and an assumed exponential form for the distribution of energies transferred in collisions with a third body. For larger systems it is evident that the role of bound excited states in the low-pressure regime falls rapidly as the size of the system increases. As the high-pressure limit is approached, however, the contribution of excited states is likely to come close to that expected simply on the basis of electronic degeneracy.     

Characterization of electronically excited states in anionic acetonitrile clusters

We have identified and examined the excited state of the cluster-solvated, valence-bound acetonitrile anion dimer, consistent with recent experimental findings, determining that the cluster excited state is of predominantly single-excitation character. Potential energy surface scans in coordinates specific to a "dissociative" normal mode common between the excited and ground states of the valence anion as well as the ground-state neutral dimer species shed light on the proposed vibrational autodetachment mechanism, with calculated excited-state lifetime consistent with experiment.     

On the internal rotations in p-cresol in its ground and first electronically excited states

The overall rotation and internal rotation of p-cresol (4-methyl-phenol) has been studied by comparison of the microwave spectrum with accurate ab initio calculations using the principal axis method in the electronic ground state. Both internal rotations, the torsions of the methyl and the hydroxyl groups relative to the aromatic ring, have been investigated. The internal rotation of the hydroxyl group can be approximately described as the motion of a symmetrical rotor on an asymmetric frame. For the methyl group it has been found that the potential barrier hindering its internal rotation is very small with the first two nonvanishing Fourier coefficients of the potential V(3) and V(6) in the same order of magnitude. Different splittings of b-type transitions for the A and E species of the methyl torsion indicate a top-top interaction between both internal rotors through the benzene ring. An effective coupling potential for the top-top interaction could be estimated. The hindering barriers of the hydroxyl and methyl rotation have been calculated using second-order Moller-Plesset perturbation theory and the approximate coupled-cluster singles-and-doubles model (CC2) in the ground state and using CC2 and the algebraic diagrammatic construction through second order in the first electronically excited state. The results are in excellent agreement with the experimental values.     

Rotational perturbation between two electronically excited states of 4HeD

The rotational structure of the D ²Σ⁺ →A²Σ⁺ transition of ⁴HeD is highly perturbed, and this is caused by the near degeneracy of the D, ν=0 and C, ν=3 vibrational levels. A perturbation analysis is presented which yields the spectroscopic constants for both of the perturbing levels, yielding the first experimental information on a vibrationally excited state of HeH.     

Variable metric optimization of molecular geometry in electronically excited states

The variable metric (VM) method is used to optimize molecular geometry in electronically excited states. A general expression for the first derivative of energy in the particular excited state is derived, considering configuration interaction of all singly excited configurations. A special expression for the excited states energy derivative is given for calculations with semiempirical methods of CNDO type. The geometry optimizations of a set of molecules in various excited states have been carried out by the CNDO/2 method. The results of computations have been discussed and compared with the available experimental data. A good agreement of the calculated geometries with the experimental ones has been shown in the first excited states and a relatively good agreement in the higher states, with some exceptions. Some special features of the proposed method are discussed.     

Quantum optimal control strategies for photoisomerization via electronically excited states

Optimal control of the photoisomerization of Li₂Na from the stable acute to the near-degenerate obtuse triangular configuration is simulated by means of representative wave packet dynamics on two ab initio potential energy surfaces for the electronic ground (X²A′) and excited (4²A′) states. Product state specifity is achieved by means of new iteration methods [W. Zhu, J. Botina and H. Rabitz, J. Chem. Phys. 108 (1998) 1953] which incorporate feedback from the control field. An additional restriction yields a smooth switch on and off behaviour of the optimized pulses. A windowed Fourier transform decomposes the optimized laser field into efficient pump–dump pulses     

Ab initio molecular dynamics and time-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy of electronically excited uracil and thymine

The reaction dynamics of excited electronic states in nucleic acid bases is a key process in DNA photodamage. Recent ultrafast spectroscopy experiments have shown multicomponent decays of excited uracil and thymine, tentatively assigned to nonadiabatic transitions involving multiple electronic states. Using both quantum chemistry and first principles quantum molecular dynamics methods we show that a true minimum on the bright S2 electronic state is responsible for the first step that occurs on a femtosecond time scale. Thus the observed femtosecond decay does not correspond to surface crossing as previously thought. We suggest that subsequent barrier crossing to the minimal energy S2/S1 conical intersection is responsible for the picosecond decay.     

Ab initio calculations of electronically excited states of cyano-substituted polyacetylene cations

The transition energies for the lowest energy pi --> pi* electronic excitations are calculated with the complete active space self-consistent field method (CASSCF) and with the complete active space second-order perturbation theory method (CASPT2) for the linear cyano-substituted polyacetylene cations, H-Cn-CN+, n = 4-11, and NC-Cn-CN+, n = 2-10. These systems are models for an important class of interstellar species. We demonstrate the utility of the theoretical calculations in assigning the experimental spectra.     

Dynamics and prototropic reactivity of electronically excited states in simple surfactant aggregates

Excitation of a molecule from the ground state to an electronically excited state can cause changes in its geometry, dipole moment, acidity or basicity, redox potentials and solvation. Bimolecular quenching of the excited state of the probe by other molecules present in the medium can be used to determine the mobilities of molecules and estimate microviscosities and encounter probabilities in the medium. Differences in excited state acidity or basicity relative to the ground state can be employed to investigate the dynamics of ultrafast proton transfer reactions. Three areas of current interest where fluorescent probes have served to elucidate important dynamic processes of molecules in simple self-aggregating surfactant systems such as aqueous micelles and reverse micelles are considered: (a) bimolecular quenching of excited states; (b) the dynamics of solvation of excited states and (c) ultrafast intermolecular excited state proton transfer (ESPT) reactions.     

Theoretical study of the singlet electronically excited states of N4

Vertical excitation energies for the lowest eleven singlet states of T_d N₄ were calculated using the TD-DFT method with the B3LYP functional, and at the EOM-CCSD level of theory. The vertical excitation energies for the five lowest-lying excited states were also obtained using the state-averaged CASSCF, CASPT2, CASPT3, and MRCI + Q methods. Our results show that the five lowest-lying states are of valence character. EOM-CCSD/d-aug-cc-pVTZ calculations predict that there are two weakly allowed optical transitions of T₂ symmetry at 10.44 and 10.82 eV. The transition to the third T₂ state, which is predicted to be at 10.89 eV, has an oscillator strength about one order of magnitude higher.     

Time-dependent approach to electronically excited states of molecules with the multiconfiguration time-dependent Hartree-Fock method

In this paper the authors show how the multiconfiguration time-dependent Hartree-Fock (MCTDHF) method can be used for the calculation of electronic properties of molecules associated with the population of excited states. In contrast to other methods for correlated electron dynamics, such as configuration interaction, MCTDHF does not rely on a solution of the electronic Schrodinger equation prior to the propagation. The authors apply this approach to the calculation of vertical excitation energies, transition dipole moments, and oscillator strengths for two test molecules, lithium hydride and methane.     

Benchmarking the performance of spin-component scaled CC2 in ground and electronically excited states

A generalization of the spin-component scaling and scaled opposite-spin modifications of second-order M?ller-Plesset perturbation theory to the approximate coupled-cluster singles-and-doubles model CC2 (termed SCS-CC2 and SOS-CC2) is discussed and a preliminary implementation of ground and excited state energies and analytic gradients is reported. The computational results for bond distances, harmonic frequencies, adiabatic and 0-0 excitation energies are compared with experimental results to benchmark their performance. It is found that both variants of the spin-scaling increase the robustness of CC2 against strong correlation effects and lead for this method even to somewhat larger improvements than those observed for second-order M?ller-Plesset perturbation theory. The spin-component scaling also enhances systematically the accuracy of CC2 for 0-0 excitation energies for pi --> pi* and n --> pi* transitions, if geometries are determined at the same level.     

Ground and electronically excited states of methyl hydroperoxide: comparison with hydrogen peroxide

Equilibrium geometries of the ground states of hydrogen peroxide (H(2)O(2)) and methyl hydroperoxide (CH(3)OOH) have been obtained using quadratic configuration interaction methods with correlation-consistent basis sets. These results are compared with experiments and prior calculations. The dipole moments of the ground states of these two molecules have been calculated. The results illustrate the sensitivity of this quantity to molecular geometry. Several excited states of H(2)O(2) and CH(3)OOH were calculated using the equation-of-motion coupled-cluster singles-and-doubles method. Aside from vertical excitation energies, excited state energies along the O-O, O-H, and C-O dissociation pathways were calculated. The results are expected to be of assistance in resolving discrepancies in the experimental interpretation of the UV absorption spectrum and photodissociation of CH(3)OOH.