Excited‐state hydrogen bonding dynamics of pyruvic acid and geminal‐diol, 2,2‐dihydroxypropanoic acid in aqueous solution: a DFT/TDDFT study

In this work, we present the optimized ground state geometrical structures, electronic excitation energies and corresponding oscillation strengths of the low‐lying electronically excited states for the isolated Tce‐CH3COCOOH and Tce‐CH3C(OH)2COOH as well as their corresponding hydrogen‐bonded dimers Tce‐CH3COCOOH‐H2O and Tce‐CH3C(OH)2COOH‐H2O through time‐dependent density functional theory method. It is found that the intermolecular hydrogen bonds C=O···H‐O are strengthened in the electronically excited states of the hydrogen‐bonded dimers Tce‐CH3COCOOH‐H2O and Tce‐CH3C(OH)2COOH‐H2O, in that the excitation energies of the related excited states for the hydrogen‐bonded dimers are decreased compared with those of the corresponding monomers. The calculated results are consistent with the rules that are first demonstrated by Zhao on the excited‐state hydrogen bonding dynamics. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.