Excited states and photochemistry of saturated molecules. ab initio calculations on methane

STO 4G calculations are carried out on methane in both tetrahedral and Jahn—Teller distorted C_2v and C_3v symmetries. Large increases in CH bond lengths are predicted in all states, and the ^IB₁ state in C_2v symmetry is predicted to dissociate to ^IB₁ methylene and ¹A₁ H₂ width no energy barrier. THe results are compared with earlier INDO calculations, and the latter are found to qualitatively consistent with the ab initio results.