Theoretical study of intermolecular proton transfer reaction in isolated 5-hydroxyisoxazole–water complexes

A systematic investigation in isolated 5-hydroxyisoxazole–water complexes (5-HIO · (H₂O)_nn = 1–3) is performed at the DFT level, employing B3LYP/6-31G(d, p) basis set. Single-point energy calculations are also performed at the MP2 level using B3LYP/6-31G(d, p) optimized geometries and the 6-311++G(d, p) basis set. The computational results show that the keto tautomer K₂ is the most stable isomer in the gas phase, and the tautomer K₁ to be the next most stable tautomer. Hydrogen bonding between HIO and the water molecule(s) will dramatically lower the barrier by a concerted multiple proton transfer mechanism. The proton transfer process of 3WE_cis ↔ 3WK₁ and 2WE_trans ↔ 2WK₂ is found to be more efficient in two tautomerization, and the barrier heights are 7.03 and 14.15 kcal/mol at B3LYP/6-31G(d, p) level, respectively. However, the proton transfer reaction between E_cis and K₁ cannot happen without solvent-assisted.