Thermal unimolecular decomposition mechanism of 2,4,6-trinitrotoluene: a first-principles DFT study

Simple C–NO₂ homolysis, 4,6-dinitroanthranil (DNAt) production by dehydration, and the nitro-nitrite rearrangement–homolysis for gas-phase TNT decomposition were recently studied by Cohen et al. (J Phys Chem A 111:11074, 2007), based on DFT calculations. Apart from those three pathways, other possible initiation processes were suggested in this study, i.e., CH₃ removal, O elimination, H escape, OH removal, HONO elimination, and nitro oxidizing adjacent backbone carbon atom. The intermediate, 3,5-dinitro-2(or 4)-methyl phenoxy, is more favor to decompose into CO and 3,5-dinitro-2(or 4)-methyl-cyclopentadienyl than to loss NO following nitro-nitrite rearrangement. Below ~1,335 K, TNT condensing to DNAt by dehydration is kinetically the most favor process, and the formations of substituted phenoxy and following cyclopentadienyl include minor contribution. Above ~1,335 K, simple C–NO₂ homolysis kinetically dominates TNT decomposition; while the secondary process changes from DNAt production to CH₃ removal above ~2,112 K; DNAt condensed from TNT by dehydration yields to that by sequential losses of OH and H above ~1,481 K and to nitro-nitrite rearrangement–fragmentation above ~1,778 K; O elimination replaces DNAt production above ~2,491 K, playing the third role in TNT decomposition; H escaping directly from TNT thrives in higher temperature (above ~2,812 K), as the fourth largest process. The kinetic analysis indicates that CH₃ removal, O elimination, and H escape paths are accessible at the suggested TNT detonation time (~100–200 fs), besides C–NO₂ homolysis. HONO elimination and nitro oxidizing adjacent backbone carbon atom paths are negligible at all temperatures. The calculations also demonstrated that some important species observed by Rogers and Dacons et al. are thermodynamically the most favor products at all temperatures, possibly stemmed from the intermediates including 4,6-dinitro-2-nitroso-benzyl alcohol, 3,5-dinitroanline, 2,6-dinitroso-4-nitro-phenylaldehyde, 3,5-dinitro-1-nitrosobenzene, 3,5-dinitroso-1-nitrobenzene, and nitrobenzene. All transition states, intermediates, and products have been indentified, the structures, vibrational frequencies, and energies of them were verified at the uB3LYP/6-311++G(d,p) level. Our calculated energies have mean unsigned errors in barrier heights of 3.4–4.2 kcal/mol (Lynch and Truhlar in J Phys Chem A 105:2936, 2001), and frequencies have the recommended scaling factors for the B3-LYP/6-311+G(d,p) method (Andersson and Uvdal in J Phys Chem A 109:2937, 2005; Merrick et al. in J Phys Chem A 111:11683, 2007). All calculations corroborate highly with the previous experimental and theoretical results, clarifying some pertinent questions.