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The recently developed multiconfiguration pair-density functional theory (MC-PDFT) combines multiconfiguration wave function theory with a density functional that depends on the on-top pair density of an electronic system. In an MC-PDFT calculation, there are two steps: a conventional multiconfiguration self-consistent-field (MCSCF) calculation and a post-MCSCF evaluation of the energy with an on-top density functional. In this work, we present the details of the MC-PDFT algorithm that avoids steeply scaling steps that are present in other post-self-consistent-field multireference calculations of dynamic correlation energy. We demonstrate the favorable scaling by considering systems of H2 molecules with active spaces of several different sizes. We then apply the MC-PDFT method to calculate the heterolytic dissociation enthalpy of ferrocene. We find that MC-PDFT yields results that are at least as accurate as complete active space second-order perturbation theory and are more stable with respect to basis set, but at a fraction of the cost in both time and memory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We extend our recent SOGGA11 approximation to the exchange-correlation functional to include a percentage of Hartree-Fock exchange. The new functional, called SOGGA11-X, has better overall performance for a broad chemical database than any previously available global hybrid generalized gradient approximation, and in addition it satisfies an extra physical constraint in that it is correct to second order in the density-gradient. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the present study, we comparatively assessed the newly developed M05 functional against a data set of reaction energies for transition-metal chemistry. The functionals to which we compare are BLYP, B3LYP, B97-2, MPWLYP1M, TPSS, and TPSSh. We draw the following conclusions: (1) TPSS gives the best performance for calculating the binding energies of three transition-metal dimers (Sc2, Ni2, and V2) that have severe multireference character, (2) B97-2 gives the best performance for calculating the binding energies of the nine metal-ligand diatomics (three monohydrides, three monoxide, and three monofluorides), and (3) M05 gives the overall best performance for all 18 data in the assessment, and it has a mean unsigned error 55% lower than the popular B3LYP functional. Since the M05 functional also gives good performance for main-group thermochemistry, for noncovalent chemistry, and for calculating barrier heights, M05 can be applied to a wide range of problems where nonhybrid functionals or functionals designed for kinetics fail. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The performance of the M06-L density functional has been tested for band gaps in seven semiconductors plus diamond and MgO. Comparison with the local spin density approximation (LSDA), Becke-Lee-Yang-Parr (BLYP), Perdew-Burke-Eernzerhof (PBE), Tao-Perdew-Staroverov-Scuseria (TPSS), and Heyd-Scuseria-Ernzerhof (HSE) functionals shows that M06-L has improved performance for calculating band gaps as compared to other local functionals, but it is less accurate than the screened hybrid HSE functional for band gaps. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This work examines the question of how a Hubbard U correction to a local exchange–correlation functional compares with adding Hartree–Fock exchange to a local functional for both solid-state and molecular properties. We compute a solid-state property, namely the band gap, and thermochemical molecular properties, in particular, main-group bond energies, transition metal–ligand bond energies, and barrier heights, to elucidate whether the DFT+U method mimics hybrid DFT. We find that a calculation with a Hubbard U correction may or may not mimic a hybrid functional—depending on the atom, the subshell, and the property to which it is applied. For band gaps, we find that adding a Hubbard U correction to the valence d orbitals of transition metals increases the band gap, which thereby gets closer to the experimental value, while adding a Hubbard U correction to valence s or p orbitals of main-group elements need not always increase the band gap. For molecular thermochemistry, we find that adding a Hubbard U correction to a local density functional need not have the same effect as adding Hartree–Fock exchange to a local density functional. For example when compared to a DFT calculation with a local exchange-correlation functional, hybrid DFT increases the barrier height in all cases, but DFT+U does not always increase the barrier height. For the band gaps of transition metal monoxides, the Hubbard-corrected results lowered the mean errors significantly and were comparable to what could be achieved with a much more expensive hybrid functional, but for reaction barrier heights and bond energies of molecules, the Hubbard correction was found to lower the mean error by only approximately a kcal/mol. As part of the analysis, we also compare VASP and Gaussian 09 calculations for the same density functional. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Determination of the thermodynamic properties of reactor constituents is the first step in designing control strategies for plasma-mediated deposition processes and is also a key fundamental issue in physical chemistry. In this work, a recently proposed multistructural statistical thermodynamic method is used to show the importance of multiple structures and torsional anharmonicity in determining the thermodynamic properties of silicon hydride clusters, which are important both in plasmas and in thermally driven systems. It includes five different categories of silicon hydride clusters and radicals, including silanes, silyl radicals, and silenes. We employed a statistical mechanical approach, namely the recently developed multistructural (MS) anharmonicity method, in combination with density functional theory to calculate the partition functions, which in turn are used to estimate thermodynamic quantities, namely Gibbs free energy, enthalpy, entropy, and heat capacity, for all of the systems considered. The calculations are performed using all of the conformational structures of each molecule or radical by employing the multistructural quasiharmonic approximation (MS-QH) and also by including torsional potential anharmonicity (MS-T). For those cases where group additivity (GA) results are available, the thermodynamic quantities obtained from our MS-T calculations differ considerably due to the fact that the GA method is based on single-structure data for isomers of each stoichiometry, and hence lack multistructural effects; whereas we find that multistructural effects are very important in silicon hydride systems. Our results also indicate that the entropic effect on the thermochemistry is huge and is dominated by multistructural effects. The entropic effect of multiple structures is also expected to be important for other kinds of chain molecules, and its effect on nucleation kinetics is expected to be large. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Multistructural canonical variational-transition-state theory with multidimensional tunneling (MS-CVT/MT) is employed to calculate thermal rate constants for the abstraction of hydrogen atoms from both positions of methanol by the hydroperoxyl and methyl radicals over the temperature range 100-3000 KL The M08-HX hybrid meta-generalized gradient approximation density functional and M08-HX with specific reaction parameters, both with the maug-cc-pVTZ basis set, were validated in part 1 of this study (Alecu, I. M; Truhlar, D. G. J. Phys. Chem. A 2011, 115, 2811) against highly accurate CCSDT(2)Q/CBS calculations for the energetics of these reactions, and they are used here to compute the properties of all stationary points and the energies, gradients, and Hessians of nonstationary points along each considered reaction path. The internal rotations in some of the transition states are found to be highly anharmonic and strongly coupled to each other, and they generate multiple structures (conformations) whose contributions are included in the partition function. It is shown that the previous estimates for these rate constants used to build kinetic models for the combustion of methanol, some of which were based on transition state theory calculations with one-dimensional tunneling corrections and harmonic-oscillator approximations or separable one-dimensional hindered rotor treatments of torsions, are appreciably different than the ones presently calculated using MS-CVT/MT. The rate constants obtained from the best MS-CVT/MT calculations carried out in this study, in which the important effects of corner cutting due to small and large reaction path curvature are captured via a microcanonical optimized multidimensional tunneling (μOMT) treatment, are recommended for future refinement of the kinetic model for methanol combustion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: We discuss and review selected recent applications and validations of the Minnesota density functionals, especially the M06 family, emphasizing nanochemistry, organic, inorganic, and biological chemistry, and catalysis and highlighting the broad accuracy of these functionals as compared to previous popular functionals for thermochemistry, kinetics, and noncovalent interactions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Density functional theory was used to examine the solvation number and aggregation state of several alkyllithium compounds in clusters with tetrahydrofuran molecules coordinated to each lithium atom. We then made the microsolvation approximation and approximated the bulk free energy of solvation by the free energy of clustering with solvent molecules in the gas phase. The trends in the computed results are in reasonable agreement with the available experimental data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a recent article, Carlier et al. (J. Org. Chem. 2006, 71, 1592) examined the prediction of several DFT functionals and showed that the most popular density functional, B3LYP, and 15 others fail badly for the prediction of the structure of protonated 2-methyl-1,2-epoxypropane. In this note, we compare the performance of several recently developed density functionals for the calculation of structures and energetics of protonated cyclic ethers, including epoxides. We found that several of the newly developed DFT methods perform better than B3LYP or any of the other 17 functionals examined by Carlier. We conclude that a recently published functional, M05-2X, has greatly improved performance for an unsymmetrical protonated epoxide, and we recommend this functional for studies that involve protonated epoxides and protonated ethers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Beginning with the MIDI! basis set (also called MIDIX), we introduce the MIDIX+, MIDIY, and MIDIY+ basis sets. Using correlated ab initio and hybrid density functional theory, we compare their performance to that of several existing basis sets for electronic structure calculations. The new basis sets are tested with databases of 358 energies of reactions, 44 barrier heights, 31 electron affinities, 18 geometries, and 29 dipole moments. The MIDI!, MIDIX+, MIDIY, and MIDIY+ basis sets are shown to be cost-efficient methods for calculating relative energies, geometries, and dipole moments. The MIDIX+ basis is shown to be particularly efficient for calculating electron affinities of large molecules. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Time-dependent density functional theory (TDDFT) holds great promise for studying photochemistry because of its affordable cost for large systems and for repeated calculations as required for direct dynamics. The chief obstacle is uncertain accuracy. There have been many validation studies, but there are also many formulations, and there have been few studies where several formulations were applied systematically to the same problems. Another issue, when TDDFT is applied with only a single exchange-correlation functional, is that errors in the functional may mask successes or failures of the formulation. Here, to try to sort out some of the issues, we apply eight formulations of adiabatic TDDFT to the first valence excitations of ten molecules with 18 density functionals of diverse types. The formulations examined are linear response from the ground state (LR-TDDFT), linear response from the ground state with the Tamm-Dancoff approximation (TDDFT-TDA), the original collinear spin-flip approximation with the Tamm-Dancoff (TD) approximation (SF1-TDDFT-TDA), the original noncollinear spin-flip approximation with the TDA approximation (SF1-NC-TDDFT-TDA), combined self-consistent-field (SCF) and collinear spin-flip calculations in the original spin-projected form (SF2-TDDFT-TDA) or non-spin-projected (NSF2-TDDFT-TDA), and combined SCF and noncollinear spin-flip calculations (SF2-NC-TDDFT-TDA and NSF2-NC-TDDFT-TDA). Comparing LR-TDDFT to TDDFT-TDA, we observed that the excitation energy is raised by the TDA; this brings the excitation energies underestimated by full linear response closer to experiment, but sometimes it makes the results worse. For ethylene and butadiene, the excitation energies are underestimated by LR-TDDFT, and the error becomes smaller making the TDA. Neither SF1-TDDFT-TDA nor SF2-TDDFT-TDA provides a lower mean unsigned error than LR-TDDFT or TDDFT-TDA. The comparison between collinear and noncollinear kernels shows that the noncollinear kernel drastically reduces the spin contamination in the systems considered here, and it makes the results more accurate than collinear spin-flip TDDFT for functionals with a low percentage of Hartree-Fock exchange and sometimes for functionals with a higher percentage of Hartree-Fock exchange, but it yields less accurate results than ground-state TDDFT. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses a study that reveal that the supramolecular interactions in a hydrocarbon nanoring host, [6]paraphenyleneacetylene, have been shown with density functionals to be very strong and size-selective. The interaction strengths of two supramolecules where the guest molecules are fullerenes and of three supramolecules where guest molecules are truncated nanotubes have been calculated

The recently developed SOGGA11 and M11-L density functionals have been tested for the prediction of bandgaps and lattice constants by comparing to databases containing 31 bandgaps and 34 lattice constants. To make a comparative assessment we also test several other density functionals against the same databases; in particular, we test the local spin density approximation, PBE, PBEsol, SOGGA, TPSS, revTPSS, and M06-L local density functionals and the HSE screened-exchange hybrid nonlocal density functional; and for a subset of 13 lattice constants we also compare the mean errors to those of the AM05 and WC local density functionals and the HISS and HSEsol nonlocal density functionals. The tests show that, of the ten functionals tested against all 65 data, the SOGGA, PBEsol, and HSE functionals are the most accurate for lattice constants, whereas the HSE, M11-L, and M06-L density functionals are the most accurate for bandgaps. However, the SOGGA11 density functional is the most accurate generalized gradient approximation for bandgaps. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We report a test of 30 density functionals, including several recent ones, for their predictions of 69 singlet-to-singlet excitation energies of 11 molecules. The reference values are experimental results collected by Caricato et al. for 30 valence excitations and 39 Rydberg excitations. All calculations employ time-dependent density functional theory in the adiabatic, linear-response approximation. As far as reasonable, all of the assignments are performed by essentially the same protocol as used by Caricato et al., and this allows us to merge our mean unsigned errors (MUEs) with the ones they calculated for both density functional and wave function methods. We find 21 of the 30 density functionals calculated here have smaller MUEs for the 30 valence states than what they obtained (0.47 eV) for the state-of-the-art EOM-CCSD wave function. In contrast, for all of density functionals the MUE for 39 Rydberg states is larger than that (0.11 eV) of EOM-CCSD. Merging the 30 density functionals calculated here with the 26 calculated by Caricato et al. makes a set of 56 density functionals. Averaging the unsigned errors over both the valence excitations and the Rydberg excitations, none of the 56 density functionals shows a lower mean unsigned error than that (0.27 eV) of EOM-CCSD. Nevertheless, two functionals are successful in having an overall mean unsigned error of 0.30 eV, and another nine are moderately successful in having overall mean unsigned errors in the range 0.32-0.36 eV. Successful or moderately successful density functionals include seven hybrid density functionals with 41% to 54% Hartree-Fock exchange, and four range-separated hybrid density functionals in which the percentage of Hartree-Fock exchange increases from 0% to 19% at small interelectronic separation to 65%-100% at long range. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Molecular fragmentation algorithms provide a powerful approach to extending electronic structure methods to very large systems. Here we present a method for including charge transfer between molecular fragments in the explicit polarization (X-Pol) fragment method for calculating potential energy surfaces. In the conventional X-Pol method, the total charge of each fragment is preserved, and charge transfer between fragments is not allowed. The description of charge transfer is made possible by treating each fragment as an open system with respect to the number of electrons. To achieve this, we applied Mermin's finite temperature method to the X-Pol wave function. In the application of this method to X-Pol, the fragments are open systems that partially equilibrate their number of electrons through a quasithermodynamics electron reservoir. The number of electrons in a given fragment can take a fractional value, and the electrons of each fragment obey the Fermi-Dirac distribution. The equilibrium state for the electrons is determined by electronegativity equalization with conservation of the total number of electrons. The amount of charge transfer is controlled by re-interpreting the temperature parameter in the Fermi-Dirac distribution function as a coupling strength parameter. We determined this coupling parameter so as to reproduce the charge transfer energy obtained by block localized energy decomposition analysis. We apply the new method to ten systems, and we show that it can yield reasonable approximations to potential energy profiles, to charge transfer stabilization energies, and to the direction and amount of charge transferred. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A database containing 17 multiplicity-changing valence and Rydberg excitation energies of p-block elements is used to test the performance of density functional theory (DFT) with approximate density functionals for calculating relative energies of spin states. We consider only systems where both the low-spin and high-spin state are well described by a single Slater determinant, thereby avoiding complications due to broken-symmetry solutions. Because the excitations studied involve a spin change, they require a balanced treatment of exchange and correlation, thus providing a hard test for approximate density functionals. We test three formalisms for predicting the multiplicity-changing transition energies. First is the ΔSCF method; we also test time-dependent density functional theory (TDDFT), both in its conventional form starting from the low-spin state and in its collinear spin-flip form starting from the high-spin state. Very diffuse basis functions are needed to give a qualitatively correct description of the Rydberg excitations. The scalar relativistic effect needs to be considered when quantitative results are desired, and we include it in the comparisons. With the ΔSCF method, most of the tested functionals give mean unsigned errors (MUEs) larger than 6 kcal/mol for valence excitations and MUEs larger than 3 kcal/mol for Rydberg excitations, but the performance for the Rydberg states is much better than can be obtained with time-dependent DFT. It is surprising to see that the long-range corrected functionals, which have 100% Hartree-Fock exchange at large inter-electronic distance, do not improve the performance for Rydberg excitations. Among all tested density functionals, ΔSCF calculations with the O3LYP, M08-HX, and OLYP functionals give the best overall performance for both valence and Rydberg excitations, with MUEs of 2.1, 2.6, and 2.7 kcal/mol, respectively. This is very encouraging since the MUE of the CCSD(T) coupled cluster method with quintuple zeta basis sets is 2.0 kcal/mol; however, caution is advised since many popular density functionals give poor results, and there can be very significant differences between the ΔSCF predictions and those from TDDFT. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As gold clusters increase in size, the preferred structure changes from planar to three-dimensional and, for anionic clusters, Aun-, the two-dimensional(2D)→three-dimensional (3D) transition is found experimentally to occur between n=11 and n=12. Most density functionals predict that planar structures are preferred up to higher n than is observed experimentally, an exception being the local spin density approximation. Here we test four relatively new functionals for this feature, in particular, M05, M06-L, M06, and SOGGA. We find that M06-L, M06, and SOGGA all predict the 2D→3D transition at the correct value of n. Since the M06-L and M06 functionals have previously been shown to be reasonably accurate for transition metal bond energies, main group atomization energies, barrier heights, and noncovalent interaction energies, and, since they are here shown to perform well for the s-d excitation energy and ionization potential of Au atoms and for the size of Aun- clusters at which the 2D→3D transition occurs, they are recommended for simulating processes catalyzed by gold clusters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The adsorption of CO on Mg(001) constitutes a challenge for current density functional approximations because of its weak interaction character. In the present work we show that the M06-2X and M06-HF exchange-correlation functionals are the first ones to provide a simultaneously satisfactory description of adsorbate geometry, vibrational frequency shift, and adsorption energy of CO on MgO(001). For a sufficiently large embedded cluster model, the three functionals of the M06 family—which contain a nonzero percentage of Hartree–Fock exchange (M06, M06-2X, and M06-HF)—all predict positive C–O vibrational shifts, in agreement with the experimental findings, while the local M06-L functional gives large negative shifts. Moreover, the shifts computed with the M06-2X and M06-HF potentials are in good agreement with the experimental shift of +14 cm-1. The interaction energy (De) calculated with M06-2X and M06-HF is ∼6.0 kcal/mol, which agrees well with the De value (∼4 kcal/mol) deduced from the D0 obtained in thermal desorption measurements on single-crystal surfaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This work presents a new fragmentmethod, the electrostaticallyembedded many-body expansion of the nonlocal energy (EE-MB-NE), andshows that it, along with thepreviously proposed electrostatically embedded many-body expansionof the correlation energy (EE-MB-CE), produces accurate results forlarge systems at the level of CCSD(T) coupled cluster theory. We primarilystudy water 16-mers, but we also test the EE-MB-CE method on waterhexamers. We analyze the distributions of two-body and three-bodyterms to show why the many-body expansion of the electrostaticallyembedded correlation energy converges faster than the many-body expansionof the entire electrostatically embedded interaction potential. Theaverage magnitude of the dimer contributions to the pairwise additive(PA) term of the correlation energy (which neglects cooperative effects)is only one-half of that of the average dimer contribution to thePA term of the expansion of the total energy; this explains why themean unsigned error (MUE) of the EE-PA-CE approximation is only one-halfof that of the EE-PA approximation. Similarly, the average magnitudeof the trimer contributions to the three-body (3B) term of the EE-3B-CEapproximation is only one-fourth of that of the EE-3B approximation,and the MUE of the EE-3B-CE approximation is one-fourth that of theEE-3B approximation. Finally, we test the efficacy of two- and three-bodydensity functional corrections. One such density functional correctionmethod, the new EE-PA-NE method, with the OLYP or the OHLYP densityfunctional (where the OHLYP functional is the OptX exchange functionalcombined with the LYP correlation functional multiplied by 0.5), hasthe best performance-to-price ratio of any method whose computationalcost scales as the third power of the number of monomers and is competitivein accuracy in the tests presented here with even the electrostaticallyembedded three-body approximation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: We present benchmark calculations of nine selected points on potential energy surfaces describing proton transfer processes in three model systems, , CH3OH…H+…OH2, and CH3COOH…OH2. The calculated relative energies of these geometries are compared to those calculated by various wave function and density functional methods, including the polarized molecular orbital (PMO) model recently developed in our research group and other semiempirical molecular orbital methods. We found that the SCC-DFTB and PMO methods (the latter available so far only for molecules consisting of only O and H and therefore only for the first of the three model systems) give results that are, on average, within 2kcal/mol of the benchmark results. Other semiempirical molecular orbital methods have mean unsigned errors (MUEs) of 3–8kcal/mol, local density functionals have MUEs in the range 0.7–3.7kcal/mol, and hybrid density functionals have MUEs of only 0.3–1.0kcal/mol, with the best density functional performance obtained by hybrid meta-GGAs, especially M06 and PW6B95. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The structures of Pd(PH3)2 and Pt(PH3)2 complexes with ethene and conjugated C n H n +2 systems (n =4, 6, 8, and 10) were studied. Their binding energies were calculated using both wave function theory (WFT) and density functional theory (DFT). Previously it was reported that the binding energy of the alkene to the transition metal does not depend strongly on the size of the conjugated C n H n +2 ligand, but that DFT methods systematically underestimate the binding energy more and more significantly as the size of the conjugated system is increased. Our results show that recently developed density functionals predict the binding energy for these systems much more accurately. New benchmark calculations carried out by the coupled cluster method based on Brueckner orbitals with double excitations and a quasiperturbative treatment of connected triple excitations (BCCD(T)) with a very large basis set agree even better with the DFT predictions than do the previous best estimates. The mean unsigned error in absolute and relative binding energies of the alkene ligands to Pd(PH3)2 is 2.5kcal/mol for the ωB97 and M06 density functionals and 2.9kcal/mol for the M06-L functional. Adding molecular mechanical damped dispersion yields even smaller mean unsigned errors: 1.3kcal/mol for the M06-D functional, 1.5kcal/mol for M06-L-D, and 1.8kcal/mol for B97-D and ωB97X-D. The new functionals also lead to improved accuracy for the analogous Pt complexes. These results show that recently developed density functionals may be very useful for studying catalytic systems involving Pd d10 centers and alkenes. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Alkylperoxyl (RO 2) and hydroperoxyalkyl (QOOH) species are crucial intermediates produced during the autoignition of transport fuels, and consequently their thermodynamic and kinetic data are very important. Since these data are not available experimentally, we take up the challenge of computing them from first principles. We compare the 1,5 shifts in 2-methyl-4-heptylperoxyl radical and 3-methylcyclohexylperoxy radical to clarify the similarities and differences of the kinetics of chain alkanes and cycloalkanes in the fuel oxidation mechanism. In order to take account of the multistructural and coupled torsional anharmonicity, we employ multistructural canonical variational transition state theory (MS-VTST) with multidimensional tunneling to calculate rate constants. The calculations explicitly include all conformers: 6 and 154 for the two reactants, 7, 6, 1, and 1 for the four transition states, and 289, 282, 8, and 5 for the four products (which are the reactants for the reverse reactions). The effects of various factors on the thermodynamic data and calculated rate constants are evaluated in detail. We found that multistructural torsional anharmonicity has a very large effect on the rate constants. This work illustrates how modern density functional and dynamics methods make it possible to calculate accurate rate constants for both branched-chain and cycloalkane peroxy radicals and hydroperoxy species. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Holthausen has recently provided a comprehensive study of density functional theory for calculating the s/d excitation energies of the 3d transition metal cations. This study did not include the effects of scalar relativistic effects, and we show here that the inclusion of scalar relativistic effects significantly alters the conclusions of the study. We find, contrary to the previous study, that local functionals are more accurate for the excitation energies of 3d transition method cations than hybrid functionals. The most accurate functionals, of the 38 tested, are SLYP, PBE, BP86, PBELYP, and PW91. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Comput Chem, 2008 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hybrid density functional theory, which is a combined Hartree-Fock and density functional method, provides a simple but effective way to incorporate nonlocal exchange effects and static and dynamical correlation energy into an orbital-based theory with affordable computational cost for many important problems of gas-phase chemistry. The inclusion of a reaction field representing an implicit solvent in a self-consistent hybrid density functional calculation provides an effective and efficient way to extend this approach to problems of liquid-phase chemistry. In previous work, we have parameterized several models based on this approach, and in the present article, we present several new parameterizations based on implicit solvation models SM5.43 and SM5.43R. In particular, we extend the applicability of these solvation models to several combinations of the MPWXhybrid-density functional with various one-electron basis sets, where MPWXdenotes a combination of Barone and Adamo’s modified version of Perdew and Wang’s exchange functional, Perdew and Wang’s correlation functional, and a percentageXof exact Hartree-Fock exchange. SM5.43R parameter optimizations are presented for the MPWX/MIDI!, MPWX/MIDI!6D, and MPWX/6-31+G(d,p) combinations withX=0 (i.e., pure density functional theory), 25, 42.8, and 60.6, and for MPWX/6-31G(d) and MPWX/6-31+G(d), withX=0, 42.8, and 60.6; this constitutes a total of 18 new parameter sets. [Note that parameter optimizations using MPW25/6-31G(d) and MPW25/6-31+G(d) were carried out in a previous SM5.43R parameterization.] For each of the five basis sets, we found no significant loss in the accuracy of the model when parameters averaged over the four values ofXare used instead of the parameters optimized for a specific value ofX. Therefore for each of the five basis sets used here, the SM5.43R and SM5.43 models are defined to have a single parameter set that can be used for any value ofXbetween 0 and 60.6. The new models yield accurate free energies of solvation for a broad range of solutes in both water and organic solvents. On the average, the mean-unsigned errors, as compared with those from experiment, of the free energies of solvation of neutral solutes range from 0.50 to 0.55 kcal/mol and those for ions range from 4.5 to 4.9 kcal/mol. Since the SM5.43R model computes the free energy of solvation as a sum of bulk-electrostatic and non-bulk-electrostatic contributions, it may be used for detailed analysis of the physical effects underlying a calculation of the free energy of solvation. Several calculations illustrating the partitioning of these contributions for a variety of solutes inn-hexadecane, 1-octanol, and water are presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Adequate polarization functions reduce the error of density functional theory (DFT) for the heat of reaction for CF4+ SiCl4from ∼9–12 kcal mol−1to ∼2–4 kcal mol−1, and using an improved density functional further reduces it to ∼1 kcal mol−1. This reaction was previously identified as a stumbling block for DFT, but we show that the problem with the previous calculations was not DFT but rather inadequate basis sets to account for intramolecular charge polarization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Screened-exchange hybrid density functionals are especially recommended for solid-state systems because they combine the advantages of hybrid functionals with the correct physics and lower computational cost associated with the attenuation of Hartree-Fock exchange at long range. We present a screenedexchange hybrid functional, M06-SX, that combines the functional form of the local revM06-L functional with a percentage of short-range nonlocal Hartree-Fock exchange. The M06-SX functional gives good results not only for a large set of training data but also for several databases quite different from the training data. The mean unsigned error (MUE) of the M06-SX functional is 2.85 kcal/mol for 418 atomic and molecular energies (AME418) in Minnesota Database 2019, which is better than all five other screened-exchange hybrid functionals tested in this work. The M06-SX functional also gives especially good results for semiconductor band gaps, molecular dissociation energies, noncovalent interactions, barrier heights, and electronic excitation energies excluding long-range charge transfer excitations. For the LC18 lattice constants database, the M06-SX functional gives an MUE of only 0.034 Å. Therefore, the M06-SX functional is well suited for studying molecular chemistry as well as solid-state physics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The abstraction and addition reactions of H with trans-N2H2 are studied by high-level ab initio methods and density functional theory. Rate constants were calculated for these two reactions by multistructural variational transition state theory with multidimensional tunneling and including torsional anharmonicity by the multistructural torsion method. Rate constants of the abstraction reaction show large variational effects, that is, the variational transition state yields a smaller rate constant than the conventional transition state; this results from the fact that the variational transition state has a higher zero-point vibrational energy than the conventional transition state. The addition reaction has a classical barrier height that is about 1 kcal/mol lower than that of the abstraction reaction, but the addition rates are lower than the abstraction rates due to vibrational adiabaticity. The calculated branching ratio of abstraction to addition is 3.5 at 200 K and decreases to 1.2 at 1000 K and 1.06 at 1500 K. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of the present investigation is to calculate partition functions and thermodynamic quantities, viz., entropy, enthalpy, heat capacity, and Gibbs free energies, for 1-butanol, 2-methyl-1-propanol, and butanal in the vapor phase. We employed the multi-structural (MS) anharmonicity method and electronic structure calculations including both explicitly correlated coupled cluster theory and density functional theory. The calculations are performed using all structures for each molecule and employing both the local harmonic approximation (MS-LH) and the inclusion of torsional anharmonicity (MS-T). The results obtained from the MS-T calculations are in excellent agreement with experimental data taken from the Thermodynamics Research Center data series and the CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics, where available. They are also compared with Benson's empirical group additivity values, where available; in most cases, the present results are more accurate than the group additivity values. In other cases, where experimental data (but not group additivity values) are available, we also obtain good agreement with experiment. This validates the accuracy of the electronic structure calculations when combined with the MS-T method for estimating the thermodynamic properties of systems with multiple torsions, and it increases our confidence in the predictions made with this method for molecules and temperatures where experimental or empirical data are not available. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Thirty four density functional approximations are tested against two diverse databases, one with 18 bond energies and one with 24 barriers. These two databases are chosen to include bond energies and barrier heights which are relevant to catalysis, and in particular the bond energy database includes metal-metal bonds, metal-ligand bonds, alkyl bond dissociation energies, and atomization energies of small main group molecules. Two revised versions of the Perdew–Burke–Ernzerhof (PBE) functional, namely the RPBE and revPBE functionals, widely used for catalysis, do improve the performance of PBE against the two diverse databases, but give worse results than B3LYP (which denotes the combination of Becke's 3-parameter hybrid treatment with Lee–Yang–Parr correlation functional). Our results show that the Minnesota functionals, M05, M06, and M06-L give the best performance for the two diverse databases, which suggests that they deserve more attention for applications to catalysis. We also obtain notably good performance with the τ-HCTHhyb, ωB97X-D, and MOHLYP functional (where MOHLYP denotes the combination of the OptX exchange functional as modified by Schultz, Zhao, and Truhlar with half of the LYP correlation functional). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The performance of the M06 family of exchange-correlation potentials for describing the electronic structure and the Heisenberg magnetic coupling constant (J) is investigated using a set of representative open-shell systems involving two unpaired electrons. The set of molecular systems studied has well defined structures, and their magnetic coupling values are known experimentally. As a general trend, the M06 functional is about equally as accurate as B3LYP or PBE0. The performance of local functionals is important because of their economy and convenience for large-scale calculations; we find that M06-L local functional of the M06 family largely improves over the local spin density approximation and the generalized gradient approximation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present a hybrid metageneralized-gradient-approximation functional, revM06, which is based on adding Hartree-Fock exchange to the revM06-L functional form. Compared with the original M06 suite of density functionals, the resulting revM06 functional has significantly improved across-the-board accuracy for both main-group and transition-metal chemistry. The revM06 functional improves on the M06-2X functional for main-group and transition-metal bond energies, atomic excitation energies, isomerization energies of large molecules, molecular structures, and both weakly and strongly correlated atomic and molecular data, and it shows a clear improvement over M06 and M06-2X for noncovalent interactions, including smoother potential curves for raregas dimers. The revM06 functional also predicts more accurate results than M06 and M06-2X for most of the outside-the-training-set test sets examined in this study. Therefore, the revM06 functional is well-suited for a broad range of chemical applications for both main-group and transition-metal elements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The application of atomic layer deposition (ALD) to metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) offers a promising new approach to synthesize designer functional materials with atomic precision. While ALD on flat substrates is well established, the complexity of the pore architecture and surface chemistry in MOFs present new challenges. Through in situ synchrotron X-ray powder diffraction, we visualize how the deposited atoms are localized and redistribute within the MOF during ALD. We demonstrate that the ALD is regioselective, with preferential deposition of oxy-Zn(II) species within the small pores of NU-1000. Complementary density functional calculations indicate that this startling regioselectivity is driven by dispersion interactions associated with the preferential adsorption sites for the organometallic precursors prior to reaction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The catalytic properties of the metal-organic framework Fe2(dobdc), containing open Fe(ll) sites, include hydroxylation of phenol by pure Fe2(dobdc) and hydroxylation of ethane by its magnesium-diluted analogue, Fe01Mg1.9(dobdc). In earlier work, the latter reaction was proposed to occur through a redox mechanism involving the generation of an iron(lV)-oxo species, which is an intermediate that is also observed or postulated (depending on the case) in some heme and nonheme enzymes and their model complexes. In the present work, we present a detailed mechanism by which the catalytic material, Fe0.1Mg1.9(dobdc), activates the strong C-H bonds of ethane. Kohn-Sham density functional and multireference wave function calculations have been performed to characterize the electronic structure of key species. We show that the catalytic nonheme-Fe hydroxylation of the strong C-H bond of ethane proceeds by a quintet single-state rt-attack pathway after the formation of highly reactive iron-oxo intermediate. The mechanistic pathway involves three key transition states, with the highest activation barrier for the transfer of oxygen from N20 to the Fe(II) center. The uncatalyzed reaction, where nitrous oxide directly oxidizes ethane to ethanol is found to have an activation barrier of 280 kj/mol, in contrast to 82 kj/mol for the slowest step in the iron(IV)-oxo catalytic mechanism. The energetics of the C-H bond activation steps of ethane and methane are also compared. Dehydrogenation and dissociation pathways that can compete with the formation of ethanol were shown to involve higher barriers than the hydroxylation pathway. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using quantum chemical approximations to understand andpredictcomplex transition metal chemistry, such as catalytic processes andmaterials properties, is an important activity in modern computationalchemistry. High-level theory can sometimes provide high-precisionbenchmarks for systems containing transition metals, and these benchmarkscan be used to understand the reliability of less expensive quantumchemical approximations that are applicable to complex systems. Here,we studied the ionization potential energy of Fe and FeC and the bonddissociation energies of FeC and FeC+by 15 density functionalapproximations: M05, M06, M06-L, ωB97, ωB97X, ωB97X-D,τ-HCTHhyb, BLYP, B3LYP, M08-HX, M08-SO, SOGGA11, SOGGA11-X,M11, and M11-L. All of the functionals predict the correct spin stateas the ground state of neutral iron atom, but five of them predictthe wrong spin state for Fe+. In the final analysis, fourfunctionals, namely M11-L, τ-HCTHhyb, SOGGA11, and M06-L, havesmall mean unsigned errors when averaged over two bond dissociationenergies and two ionization potentials. In fact, the results showthat M11-L gives the smallest averaged mean unsigned error, i.e.,M11-L is the most reliable density functional for these iron carbidesystems among those studied. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Multistructural canonical variational transition-statetheory withsmall-curvature multidimensional tunneling (MS-CVT/SCT) is employedto calculate thermal rate constants for hydrogen-atom abstractionfrom carbon-1 of n-butanol by the hydroperoxyl radicalover the temperature range 250–2000 K. The M08-SO hybrid meta-GGAdensity functional was validated against CCSD(T)-F12a explicitly correlatedwave function calculations with the jul-cc-pVTZ basis set. It wasthen used to compute the properties of all stationary points and theenergies and Hessians of a few nonstationary points along the reactionpath, which were then used to generate a potential energy surfaceby the multiconfiguration Shepard interpolation (MCSI) method. Theinternal rotations in the transition state for this reaction (likethose in the reactant alcohol) are strongly coupled to each otherand generate multiple stable conformations, which make important contributionsto the partition functions. It is shown that neglecting to accountfor the multiple-structure effects and torsional potential anharmonicityeffects that arise from the torsional modes would lead to order-of-magnitudeerrors in the calculated rate constants at temperatures of interestin combustion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Electronic singlet excitations of stacked adenine-thymine (AT) and guanine-cytosine (GC) complexes have been investigated with respect to local excitation and charge-transfer (CT) characters. Potential energy curves for rigid displacement of the nucleobases have been computed to establish the distance dependence of the CT states. The second-order algebraic diagrammatic construction [ADC(2)] method served as reference approach for comparison to a selected set of density functionals used within the time-dependent density functional theory (TD-DFT). Particular attention was dedicated to the performance of the recently developed family of M06 functionals. The calculations for the stacked complexes show that at the ADC(2) level, the lowest CT state is S for the AT and as S for the GC pair. At the reference geometry, the actual charge transferred is found to be 0.73 e for AT. In case of GC, this amount is much smaller (0.17 e). With increasing separation of the two nucleobases, the CT state is strongly destabilized. The M06-2X version provides a relatively good reproduction of the ADC(2) results. It avoids the serious overstabilization and overcrowding of the spectrum found with the B3LYP functional. On the other hand, M06-HF destabilizes the CT state too strongly. TD-DFT/M06-2X calculations in solution (heptane, isoquinoline, and water) using the polarizable continuum model show a stabilization of the CT state and an increase in CT character with increasing polarity of the solvent. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Comput Chem, 2011 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents corrections to the article, entitled `Density functional solvation model based on CM2 atomic charges' published in the volume 109 issue of the `Journal of Chemical Physics'.

This study examines whether the use of more accurate embedding potentials improves the convergence of quantum mechanics/molecular mechanics (QM/MM) models with respect to the size of the QM region. In conjunction with density functional theory calculations using the ωB97X-D functional, various embedding potentials including the TIP3P water model, the effective fragment potential (EFP), and semi-empirical methods (PM6, PM7, and DFTB) were used to simulate the deprotonation energies of solvated acid clusters. The calculations were performed on solvated neutral (HA) and cationic (HB+) acids clusters containing 160 and 480 water molecules using configurations sampled from molecular dynamics simulations. Consistently, the ωB97X-D/EFP model performed the best when using a minimal QM region size. The performance for the other potentials appears to be highly sensitive to the charge character of the acid/base pair. Neutral acids display the expected trend that semi-empirical methods generally perform better than TIP3P; however, an opposite trend was observed for the cationic acids. Additionally, electronic embedding provided an improvement over mechanical embedding for the cationic systems, but not the neutral acids. For the best performing ωB97X-D/EFP model, a QM region containing about 6% of the total number of solvent molecules is needed to approach within 10 kJ mol−1 of the pure QM result if the QM region was chosen based on the distance from the reaction centre. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]