Polarization of a diffuse soft particle subjected to an alternating current field

The polarization of a diffuse soft particle submerged in an aqueous electrolyte and subjected to a uniform alternating electric field is theoretically analyzed with the standard electrokinetic model (the Poisson-Nernst-Planck equations). The particle consists of a rigid uncharged core and a charged diffuse polyelectrolytic shell (soft layer) permeable to ions and solvent. Our focus is on the impact of the characteristics of the soft layer including the Donnan potential, the soft layer thickness, and the friction coefficient of the soft layer on the dipole coefficient, characterizing the strength of the polarization. Under the limits of thin double layers and thin polyelectrolytic shells, approximate analytical expressions to evaluate the dipole moment coefficients are derived for high-frequency and low-frequency ranges, respectively. The analytical results are compared and agree favorably with those numerically computed by the standard model. Interestingly, we discover that when the double layer is comparable to the soft layer the dipole moment behaves qualitatively differently at different Donnan potentials. When the Donnan potential is small, the dipole moment decreases as the double layer increases. In contrast, at large Donnan potentials, the dipole moment increases with the increase in the double layer. The distinct responses to Donnan potentials are attributed to the impact of the associated double layer on the charge distribution of mobile ions inside the soft layer. The theoretical model provides a fundamental basis for interpreting the polarization of heterogeneous systems, including environmental or biological colloids or microgel particles.     

Geometrical derivatives of dipole moments and polarizabilities

Molecular dipole moments and polarizabilities, as well as their geometrical derivatives, are given analytical expressions for multiconfiguration self-consistent-field and configuration interaction wavefunctions. By considering the response of the electronic wavefunction induced by electric field and geometrical displacement terms in the Hamiltonian, the response of the total electronic energy to these terms is analyzed. The dipole moment and polarizability are then identified through the factors in the energy which are linear and quadratic in the electric field, respectively. Derivatives with respect to molecular deformation are obtained by identifying factors in these moments which are linear, quadratic, etc., in the distortion parameter. The analytical derivative expressions obtained here are compared to those which arise through finite-difference calculations, and it is shown how previous configuration-interaction-based finite difference dipole moment and polarizability derivatives are wrong. The proper means of treating such derivatives are detailed.     

Numerical solution for itinerant libration in two dimensions

The planar itinerant oscillator model of molecular motion in a structured fluid, developed recently by Coffey et al., is simulated by invoking collisions between 120 rough annuli within which are harmonically bound disks carrying a dipole unit vector u. It is found that the stochastic equations of motion of the analytical treatment produce results which can be reproduced very accurately with the deterministic equations of motion used in the computer simulation. This implies that the simulation may be extended to problems beyond analytical tractability, such as itinerant libration in three dimensions, and libration combined with centre of mass oscillation. The use of a model such as this is considered as intermediate between simple brownian-motion theory and a full scale simulation of polyatomics.     

An interpretation of the enhancement of the water dipole moment due to the presence of other water molecules

The dipole moment of the gas phase water monomer is 1.85 D. When solvated in bulk water, the dipole moment of an individual water molecule is observed to be enhanced to the much larger value of 2.9 +/- 0.6 D. To understand the origin of this dipole moment enhancement, the effective fragment potential (EFP) method is used to solvate an ab initio water molecule to predict the dipole moments for various cluster sizes. The dipole moment as a function of cluster size, nH 2O, is investigated [for n = 6-20 (even n), 26, 32, 41, and 50]. Localized charge distributions are used in conjunction with localized molecular orbitals to interpret the dipole moment enhancement. These calculations suggest that the enhancement of the dipole moment originates from the decrease of the angle between the dipole vectors of the lone pairs on oxygen as the number of hydrogen bonds to that oxygen increases. Thus, the decreased angle, and the consequent increase in water dipole moment, is most likely to occur in environments with a larger number of hydrogen bonds, such as the center of a cluster of water molecules.     

On the calculation of dipole moment and polarizability derivatives by the analytical energy gradient method: Application to the formaldehyde molecule

Following the suggestion of Komornicki and McIver we have implemented an efficient computational scheme for the evaluation of dipole moment and polarizability derivatives at the Hartree-Fock SCF level. The derivatives are obtained by utilizing the analytical gradients of the molecular energy, calculated in the presence of an external electric field, with respect to the atomic cartesian coordinates, which are differentiated numerically with respect to the field. The implementation of the method within the framework of the MOLECULE program is discussed, concentrating on such aspects as numerical accuracy, utilization of molecular symmetry and computational efficiency. As an application, the dipole moment and polarizability derivatives of the formaldehyde molecule have been calculated, yielding infrared intensities and Raman scattering activities in the double harmonic approximation. The theoretical results are compared with the available experimental data; the agreement is satisfactory given the inherent restrictions of the SCF model.     

Statistical Thermodynamics of a Dipole Hard Sphere Liquid. Hindered Rotation Model

Approximate analytical expressions are obtained using the hindered molecular rotation model to describe the thermodynamic properties of a model polar liquid of dipolar hard spheres; the results are in good agreement with the available computer simulation data. A polar liquid is represented as a macromolecular knot of particles bonded by dipole forces. The resulting formulas correspond to the first and second neighbor interaction approximation. The formulas may be applied to classical one-dimensional systems described by the Ising or Heisenberg Hamiltonians.     

Multidimensional infrared spectroscopy for molecular vibrational modes with dipolar interactions, anharmonicity, and nonlinearity of dipole moments and polarizability

We present an analytical expression for the linear and nonlinear infrared spectra of interacting molecular vibrational motions. Each of the molecular modes is explicitly represented by a classical damped oscillator on an anharmonic multidimensional potential-energy surface. The two essential interactions, the dipole-dipole (DD) and the dipole-induced-dipole (DID) interactions, are taken into account, and each dipole moment and polarizability are expanded to nonlinear order with respect to the nuclear vibrational coordinate. Our analytical treatment leads to expressions for the contributions of anharmonicity, DD and DID interactions, and the nonlinearity of dipole moments and polarizability elements to the one-, two-, and three-dimensional spectra as separated terms, which allows us to discuss the relative importance of these respective contributions. We can calculate multidimensional signals for various configurations of molecules interacting through DD and DID interactions for different material parameters over the whole range of frequencies. We demonstrate that contributions from the DD and DID interactions and anharmonicity are separately detectable through the third-order three-dimensional IR spectroscopy, whereas they cannot be distinguished from each other in either the linear or the second-order IR spectroscopies. The possibility of obtaining the intra- or intermolecular structural information from multidimensional spectra is also discussed.     

A mean field analysis of the static dielectric behavior of linear lower alcohols

The static dielectric responses of methanol, ethanol, and 1-propanol up to 1-hexanol are discussed in terms of a stiff-chain lattice model for the alcohol clusters. An analytical expression for the Kirkwood correlation factor gK is derived in terms of the canonical partition function associated to the configurational statistics of any of the dimers building up a chain. This allows for the estimate of the dipole moment mu0 of an alcohol molecule in the liquid phase from the temperature dependence of the dielectric constant. All alcohol species appear to be characterized by a dipole moment larger than in the vapor phase. The Kirkwood correlation factor is found to be an increasing function of the alkyl tail length.     

A discrete interaction model/quantum mechanical method to describe the interaction of metal nanoparticles and molecular absorption

A frequency-dependent quantum mechanics/molecular mechanics method for the calculation of response properties of molecules adsorbed on metal nanoparticles is presented. This discrete interaction model/quantum mechanics (DIM/QM) method represents the nanoparticle atomistically, thus accounting for the local environment of the nanoparticle surface on the optical properties of the adsorbed molecule. Using the DIM/QM method, we investigate the coupling between the absorption of a silver nanoparticle and of a substituted naphthoquinone. This system is chosen since it shows strong coupling due to a molecular absorption peak that overlaps with the plasmon excitation in the metal nanoparticle. We show that there is a strong dependence not only on the distance of the molecule from the metal nanoparticle but also on its orientation relative to the nanoparticle. We find that when the transition dipole moment of an excitation is oriented towards the nanoparticle there is a significant increase in the molecular absorption as a result of coupling to the metal nanoparticle. In contrast, we find that the molecular absorption is decreased when the transition dipole moment is oriented parallel to the metal nanoparticle. The coupling between the molecule and the metal nanoparticle is found to be surprisingly long range and important on a length scale comparable to the size of the metal nanoparticle. A simple analytical model that describes the molecule and the metal nanoparticle as two interacting point objects is found to be in excellent agreement with the full DIM/QM calculations over the entire range studied. The results presented here are important for understanding plasmon-exciton hybridization, plasmon enhanced photochemistry, and single-molecule surface-enhanced Raman scattering.     

Mixed quantum-classical description of spectroscopy of dissipative systems

Mixed quantum-classical statistical mechanics is employed to calculate dipole moment correlation function and linear absorption spectra. A quantum two-level subsystem interacting with quantum vibrations (primary oscillators) which in turn are coupled to a classical bath composed of infinite set of harmonic oscillators is used as a dissipative system. Starting with mixed quantum-classical Liouville equation for the evaluation of the mixed quantum-classical dipole moment correlation function and using coherent states and the inverse of Baker-Campbell-Hausdorf formula to evaluate the trace over the primary oscillators, whereby, a closed analytical expression for the electronic dipole moment correlation function is obtained. Illustrations of several absorption spectra at different temperatures are provided. An approximate optical four-point correlation is obtained in the high temperature limit. A strategy for deriving an exact optical four-point correlation is suggested.     

Beyond Förster resonance energy transfer in linear nanoscale systems

The line dipole approximation is used to investigate analytical corrections to the F?rster energy transfer rate, k, derived via the point dipole approximation. It is shown that that for molecules whose conjugation length, L, is much larger than the separation, R, between molecules the line dipole approximation predicts k ~ (RL)?2 ~ (RN)?2 (where N is the number of conjugated monomer units). This is in contrast to the point dipole approximation, which predicts k ~ L2R?? ~ N2R??.     

Effects of permanent dipole moments in transient four-wave mixing experiments

A two-pulse degenerate four-wave mixing experiment is analyzed in the case where the medium under investigation can be modeled by two-level systems having unequal permanent dipole moments. By modeling the light pulses by double exponentials [exp(-Gamma/t/)], we give an analytical expression of the third-order nonlinear polarization of the medium. We apply this result to simulate the measured signal in such experiment. We show that in the case of a two-photon transition, a signal can be detected if the pump pulse interacts with the medium before the probe pulse contrary to what is observed for excitations in the resonance region. An attempt to explain this behavior is made and the detected signal is analyzed in terms of pure coherent processes. This effect appears as a signature of the presence of permanent dipole moments. To test this property on a more realistic system, we then have considered a one-dimensional frequency-selected infrared degenerate four-wave mixing experiment on a molecular anharmonic vibrational mode modeled by a Morse potential and coupled to a dissipative bath of harmonic oscillators. We show that the two-photon transitions allowed by the presence of permanent dipole moments enable to analyze the multilevel system dynamics as if they were the one of a two-level system. Our results can also be extended to the case of inhomogeneous broadening and are of interest to study the infrared photon-echo response of anharmonic vibrational modes.     

On the performance of molecular polarization methods. I. Water and carbon tetrachloride close to a point charge

The three main methods to implement molecular polarization (point dipoles, fluctuating charges, and shell model) are tested against high level ab initio calculations for a molecule (water, carbon tetrachloride) close to a point charge (at the distance of a lithium or magnesium ion). The goal is to check whether an approximation (linear polarization) strictly valid at large intermolecular distances is sufficiently accurate for liquid state molecular dynamics simulations, where strong polarization effects are to be expected at short separations. The monitored observable is the molecular dipole moment as a function of the charge-molecule distance for selected molecular orientations. Analytic formulas are derived for the components of the molecular polarization tensor, facilitating the optimization of the performance for each polarization method as a function of its underlying parameters. Overall, the methods studied provide a remarkably good representation of the induced dipole, with no divergences appearing even at the shortest distances. For water close to a monovalent point charge the point dipole model, implemented with one or three dipoles, accurately reproduces the water dipole moment at all distances. Deficiencies appear as the molecular polarizability and/or charge increase: basically, the ab initio induced moments grow faster at intermediate distances than the linear increase characteristic of the phenomenological polarization methods, suggesting that nonlinear effects (hyperpolarizability) cannot be neglected in these cases. Regarding the capabilities of each method, the point dipole method is the one that performs best overall, with the shell model achieving acceptable results in most instances. The fluctuating charge method shows some noticeable limitations for implementations of comparable complexity (in terms of the number of sites required).     

Dipolar response of hydrated proteins

The paper presents an analytical theory and numerical simulations of the dipolar response of hydrated proteins in solution. We calculate the effective dielectric constant representing the average dipole moment induced at the protein by a uniform external field. The dielectric constant shows a remarkable variation among the proteins, changing from 0.5 for ubiquitin to 640 for cytochrome c. The former value implies a negative dipolar susceptibility, that is a dia-electric dipolar response and negative dielectrophoresis. It means that ubiquitin, carrying an average dipole of ?240 D, is expected to repel from the region of a stronger electric field. This outcome is the result of a negative cross-correlation between the protein and water dipoles, compensating for the positive variance of the intrinsic protein dipole in the overall dipolar susceptibility. In contrast to the neutral ubiquitin, charged proteins studied here show para-electric dipolar response and positive dielectrophoresis. The study suggests that the dipolar response of proteins in solution is strongly affected by the coupling of the protein surface charge to the hydration water. The protein-water dipolar cross-correlations are long-ranged, extending ~2 nm from the protein surface into the bulk. A similar correlation length of about 1 nm is seen for the electrostatic potential produced by the hydration water inside the protein. The analysis of numerical simulations suggests that the polarization of the protein-water interface is highly heterogeneous and does not follow the standard dielectric results for cavities carved in dielectrics. The polarization of the water shell gains in importance, relative to the intrinsic protein dipole, at high frequencies, above the protein Debye peak. The induced interfacial dipole can be either parallel or antiparallel to the protein dipole, depending on the distribution of the protein surface charge. As a result, the high-frequency absorption of the protein solution can be either higher or lower than the absorption of water. Both scenarios have been experimentally observed in the THz window of radiation.     

First derivatives of correlated wave functions by a matrix-oriented method: Preliminary application to molecular dipole and quadrupole moments

A direct, matrix-oriented procedure in the context of the self-consistent electron pairs (SCEP) method has been implemented for the evaluation of first derivatives of the energy of a variational configuration interaction wavefunction. This has been applied in calculating dipole and quadrupole moments of the correlated charge distributions of several small molecules. As already established, the analytical differentiation being carried out yields properties slightly different than those calculated by integration with the one-electron density. The matrix-oriented analytical differentiation is computationally competitive with construction of the one-electron density.     

Asymptotic multipolar expansion of collision-induced properties

The collision-induced (CI) dipole moment, CI polarizability, and CI hyperpolarizability are considered for three H(2)-rare gas (Rg) pairs (Rg = He, Ne, Ar). In this study, the symmetry-adapted (SA) components, the projection of the CI dipole, polarizability, and hyperpolarizability on an appropriately tailored set of spherical harmonics are calculated. A set of equations for the respective SA components is derived. The Cartesian components of the CI properties calculated by quantum chemistry methods for three intermolecular geometries are used in our calculations as input data. The analytical, multipolar long-range behavior of the CI properties studied is considered within a multipole-induced multipole model. Taking the SA components at large distances, the ab initio SA numerical results and the model semianalytical data were compared. In general, a good agreement has been found. The results of our study are expected to be of value in spectral line shape analysis and in modeling of processes in the Earth's and planetary atmospheres.     

Analytical solutions for rotational diffusion in the mean field potential: application to the theory of dielectric relaxation in nematic liquid crystals

A theory of dielectric relaxation in nematics is developed for a molecular dipole moment directed at an arbitrary angle to the molecular long axis. Both exact and simple approximate analytical formulae for the longitudinal and transverse components of the complex dielectric permittivity tensor are obtained for the non-inertial rotational Brownian motion of a molecule in the mean field potential of Maier and Saupe. It appears that both longitudinal and transverse relaxation processes are effectively described by two Debye type mechanisms with corresponding relaxation times and dielectric strengths expressed in terms of the order parameter. The generalization of the theory for an arbitrary axially symmetric mean field potential is given.     

Calculation of one-electron properties using limited configuration interaction techniques

One-electron properties may be evaluated by configuration interaction methods using analytical differentiation of the total energy with respect to an external perturbation parameter. Dipole moments are reported using such a method for CO and H₂CO. Inclusion of single substitutions does not change calculated dipole moments appreciably with this method. The differences between this method and the direct evaluation of an expectation value are discussed.     

Dipole active vibrations and dipole moments of N2 and O2 physisorbed on a metal surface

We have, in infrared reflection absorption measurements, observed narrow dipole active absorption lines associated with the fundamental internal vibrational transitions of N(2) and O(2) physisorbed at 30 K on the chemically inert Pt(111)(1 x 1)H surface. Such transitions are forbidden for free homonuclear molecules and become dipole active at a metal surface due to polarization induced surface dipole moments. The measurements show that the internal stretch vibration frequencies are lowered by 7-8 cm(-1) relative to the gas phase values. The measured static and dynamic dipole moments are in the ranges of 0.06-0.07 and 0.001-0.002 D, respectively. We find that good estimates of the induced dynamic as well as the static dipole moments can in general be obtained from a van der Waals model but that the ratios of the measured static and dynamic moments indicates a need for a refinement of the dipole moment function.