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The Mo/W-containing metalloenzyme formate dehydrogenase (FDH) is an efficient and selective natural catalyst that reversibly converts CO

A delicate interplay of covalent and noncovalent interactions gives proteins their unique ability to flexibly play numerous roles in cellular processes. This interplay is inherently quantum mechanical and highly dynamic in nature. To directly interrogate the evolving nature of the electronic structure of proteins, we carry out 100-ps-scale ab initio molecular dynamics simulations of three representative small proteins with range-separated hybrid density functional theory. We quantify the nature and length-scale of the coupling of residue-specific charge probability distributions in these proteins. While some nonpolar residues exhibit expectedly narrow charge distributions, most polar and charged residues exhibit broad, multimodal distributions. Even for nonpolar residues, we observe sequence-specific deviations corresponding to charge accumulation or depletion that would be challenging to capture in a fixed charge force field. We quantify the effect of residue–residue interactions on charge distributions first with linear cross-correlations. We then show how additional insight can be gained from evaluating the mutual information of charge distributions. We show that a significant number of residues couple most strongly with residues that are distant in both sequence and space over a range of secondary structures including a-helical, b-sheet, disulfide bridging, and lasso motifs. The mutual information analysis is necessary to capture coupling between some polar and charged residues. These analyses are expected to be broadly useful in understanding the mechanisms of long-range charge transfer in proteins and for determining what interactions require a quantum mechanical description for predictive simulation of enzyme mechanism and protein function.

The design of bioinspired synthetic inorganic molecular complexes is challenging, due to a lack of understanding of enzyme action and the degree to which that action can be translated into mimics. Exemplary of this challenge is the reversible conversion of formate into CO2 by formate dehydrogenase (FDH) enzymes with Mo/W centers in large molybdopterin cofactors. Despite numerous efforts to synthesize Mo/W-containing molecular complexes, none have been demonstrated to reproduce the full reactivity of FDH. Here, we carry out a large-scale, high-throughput screening study on all mononuclear Mo/W complexes currently deposited in Cambridge Structural Database (CSD). Using density functional theory, we systematically investigate the individual effects of metal identity, ligand identity, oxidation state, and coordination number on structural, electronic and catalytic properties. We compare our results on molecular complexes with quantum mechanics/molecular mechanics simulations on a representative FDH enzyme to further elucidate the influence of the enzyme environment. These comparisons reveal that the enzyme environment primarily influences the metal-local geometry, and these metal-local structural variations can improve catalysis. Through a series of computational mutations on molecular complexes, we extend beyond the CSD structures to further identify the limits of varied chalcogen and metal identity. This broad set and comparison reveal relatively little variation of electronic properties of the metal center due to the presence of the enzyme environment or changes in metal-distant ligand chemistry. Instead, these properties are found to be much more sensitive to the identity of the metal and the nature of the bound terminal chalcogen.

Methyl transferases (MTases) are a well-studied class of enzymes for which competing enzymatic enhancement mechanisms have been suggested, ranging from structural methyl group CH···X hydrogen bonds (HBs) to electrostatic- and charge-transfer-driven stabilization of the transition state (TS). We identified all Class I MTases for which reasonable resolution (2.0 Å) crystal structures could be used to form catalytically competent ternary complexes for multiscale (i.e., quantum-mechanical/molecular-mechanical or QM/MM) simulation of the S

An understanding of protein stability requires capturing dynamic rearrangements and coupled properties over long lengthscales. Nevertheless, the extent of coupling in these systems has typically only been studied for classical degrees of freedom. To understand the potential benefit of extending such analysis to the coupling of electronic structure properties, we have carried out extensive semi-empirical quantum mechanical molecular dynamics of two Trp-cage variants. Small differences in the sequence of the two peptides lead to differences in their thermal stability that are revealed through electronic structure coupling analysis. In comparison, we find limited evidence that geometric coupling can distinguish the behavior of the two peptides. We show that Asp1 in the more stable variant shows significantly enhanced coupling to both sequence-adjacent and more sequence-distant residues. Non-nearest-neighbor couplings are stronger in the more stable variant, indicating a network of residues that help stabilize the protein. Our study highlights the complementary benefit of charge coupling analysis to interpret protein structure-function relationships.

Transition-metal complexes are attractive targets for the design of catalysts and functional materials. The behavior of the metal-organic bond, while very tunable for achieving target properties, is challenging to predict and necessitates searching a wide and complex space to identify needles in haystacks for target applications. This review will focus on the techniques that make high-throughput search of transition-metal chemical space feasible for the discovery of complexes with desirable properties. The review will cover the development, promise, and limitations of "traditional" computational chemistry (i.e., force field, semiempirical, and density functional theory methods) as it pertains to data generation for inorganic molecular discovery. The review will also discuss the opportunities and limitations in leveraging experimental data sources. We will focus on how advances in statistical modeling, artificial intelligence, multiobjective optimization, and automation accelerate discovery of lead compounds and design rules. The overall objective of this review is to showcase how bringing together advances from diverse areas of computational chemistry and computer science have enabled the rapid uncovering of structure-property relationships in transition-metal chemistry. We aim to highlight how unique considerations in motifs of metal-organic bonding (e.g., variable spin and oxidation state, and bonding strength/nature) set them and their discovery apart from more commonly considered organic molecules. We will also highlight how uncertainty and relative data scarcity in transition-metal chemistry motivate specific developments in machine learning representations, model training, and in computational chemistry. Finally, we will conclude with an outlook of areas of opportunity for the accelerated discovery of transition-metal complexes.

A delicate interplay of covalent and noncovalent interactions gives proteins their unique ability to flexibly play numerous roles in cellular processes. This interplay is inherently quantum mechanical and highly dynamic in nature. To directly interrogate the evolving nature of the electronic structure of proteins, we carry out 100-ps-scale ab initio molecular dynamics simulations of three representative small proteins with range-separated hybrid density functional theory. We quantify the nature and length-scale of the coupling of residue-specific charge probability distributions in these proteins. While some nonpolar residues exhibit expectedly narrow charge distributions, most polar and charged residues exhibit broad, multimodal distributions. Even for nonpolar residues, we observe sequence-specific deviations corresponding to charge accumulation or depletion that would be challenging to capture in a fixed charge force field. We quantify the effect of residue–residue interactions on charge distributions first with linear cross-correlations. We then show how additional insight can be gained from evaluating the mutual information of charge distributions. We show that a significant number of residues couple most strongly with residues that are distant in both sequence and space over a range of secondary structures including a-helical, b-sheet, disulfide bridging, and lasso motifs. The mutual information analysis is necessary to capture coupling between some polar and charged residues. These analyses are expected to be broadly useful in understanding the mechanisms of long-range charge transfer in proteins and for determining what interactions require a quantum mechanical description for predictive simulation of enzyme mechanism and protein function.

Virtual high throughput screening, typically driven by first-principles, density functional theory calculations, has emerged as a powerful tool for the discovery of new materials. Although the computational materials science community has benefited from open source tools for the rapid structure generation, calculation, and analysis of crystalline inorganic materials, software and strategies to address the unique challenges of inorganic complex discovery have not been as widely available. We present a unified view of our recent developments in the open source molSimplify code for inorganic discovery. Building on our previous efforts in the automated generation of highly accurate inorganic molecular structures, first-principles simulation, and property analysis to accelerate high-throughput screening, we have recently incorporated a neural network that both improves structure generation and predicts electronic properties prior to first-principles calculation. We also provide an overview of how multimillion ...

Indium phosphide quantum dots (QDs) represent promising replacements for more toxic QDs, but InP QD production lags behind other QD materials due to limited understanding of how to tune InP QD growth. We carry out a first-principles, computational screen of the tuning of In carboxylate precursor chemistry to alter the kinetics of elementary steps in InP QD growth. We employ a large database normally used for discovery of therapeutic drug-like molecules to discover design rules for these inorganic complexes while maintaining realism (i.e., stable, synthetically accessible substituents) and providing diversity in a 210-molecule test set. We show the In–O bond cleavage energy, which is tuned through ligand functionalization, to be a useful proxy for In–P bond formation energetics in InP QD synthesis. Energy decomposition analysis on a 32-molecule subset reveals that lower activation energies correlate to later transition states, due to stabilization from greater In–P bond formation and more favorable reactio...

Methyl transferases (MTases) are a well-studied class of enzymes for which competing enzymatic enhancement mechanisms have been suggested, ranging from structural methyl group C-H···X hydrogen bonds (HBs) to electrostatic- and charge-transfer-driven stabilization of the transition state (TS). We identified all Class I MTases for which reasonable resolution (< 2.0 Å) crystal structures could be used to form catalytically competent ternary complexes for multi-scale (i.e., quantum-mechanical/molecular-mechanical or QM/MM) simulation of the SN2 methyl transfer reaction coordinate. The four Class I MTases studied have both distinct functions (e.g., protein repair or biosynthesis) and substrate nucleophiles (i.e., C, N, or O). While CH···X HBs stabilize all reactant complexes, no universal TS stabilization role is found for these interactions in MTases. A consistent picture is instead obtained through analysis of charge transfer and electrostatics, wherein the majority of cofactor-substrate charge separation is maintained in the TS region, and electrostatic potential is correlated with substrate nucleophilicity (i.e., intrinsic reactivity).

Biosynthetic enzyme complexes selectively catalyze challenging chemical transformations, including alkane functionalization (e.g., halogenation of threonine, Thr, by non-heme iron SyrB2). However, the role of complex formation in enabling reactivity and guiding selectivity is poorly understood, owing to the challenges associated with obtaining detailed structural information of the dynamically associating protein complexes. Combining over 10 ms of classical molecular dynamics of SyrB2 and the acyl carrier protein SyrB1 with large-scale QM/MM simulation, we investigate the substrate–protein and protein–protein dynamics that give rise to experimentally observed substrate positioning and reactivity trends. We confirm the presence of a hypothesized substrate-delivery channel in SyrB2 through free energy simulations that show channel opening with a low free energy barrier. We identify stabilizing interactions at the SyrB2/SyrB1 interface that are compatible with phosphopantatheine (PPant) delivery of substrate to SyrB2. By sampling metal–substrate distances observed in experimental spectroscopy of native SyrB2/SyrB1-PPant-S-Thr and non-native substrates, we characterize essential protein–substrate interactions that are responsible for substrate positioning, and thus, reactivity. We observe the hydroxyl sidechain and terminal amine of the native Thr substrate to form cooperative hydrogen bonds with a single N123 residue in SyrB2. In comparison, non-native substrates that lack the hydroxyl interact more flexibly with the protein and therefore can orient closer to the Fe center, explaining their preferential hydroxylation and higher turnover frequencies.

Enzymes have evolved to facilitate challenging reactions at ambient conditions with specificity seldom matched by other catalysts. Computational modeling provides valuable insight into catalytic mechanism, and the large size of enzymes mandates multi-scale, quantum mechanical-molecular mechanical (QM/MM) simulations. Although QM/MM plays an essential role in balancing simulation cost to enable sampling with full QM treatment needed to understand electronic structure in enzyme active sites, the relative importance of these two strategies for understanding enzyme mechanism is not well known. We explore challenges in QM/MM for studying the reactivity and stability of three diverse enzymes: i) Mg2+-dependent catechol O-methyltransferase (COMT), ii) radical enzyme choline trimethylamine lyase (CutC), and iii) DNA methyltransferase (DNMT1), which has structural Zn2+ binding sites. In COMT, strong non-covalent interactions lead to long range coupling of electronic structure properties across the active site, but the more isolated nature of the metallocofactor in DNMT1 leads to faster convergence of some properties. We quantify these effects in COMT by computing covariance matrices of by-residue electronic structure properties during dynamics and along the reaction coordinate. In CutC, we observe spontaneous bond cleavage following initiation events, highlighting the importance of sampling and dynamics. We use electronic structure analysis to quantify the relative importance of CHO and OHO non-covalent interactions in imparting reactivity. These three diverse cases enable us to provide some general recommendations regarding QM/MM simulation of enzymes.

The acetylene emission spectrum from the trans-bent electronically excited à state to the linear ground electronic X̃ state has attracted considerable attention because it grants Franck–Condon access to local bending vibrational levels of the X̃ state with large-amplitude motion along the acetylene ⇌ vinylidene isomerization coordinate. For emission from the ground vibrational level of the à state, there is a simplifying set of Franck–Condon propensity rules that gives rise to only one zero-order bright state per conserved vibrational polyad of the X̃ state. Unfortunately, when the upper level involves excitation in the highly admixed ungerade bending modes, ν4′ and ν6′, the simplifying Franck–Condon propensity rule breaks down--as long as the usual polar basis (with v and l quantum numbers) is used to describe the degenerate bending vibrations of the X̃ state--and the intrapolyad intensities result from complicated interference patterns between many zero-order bright states. In this article, we show that, when the degenerate bending levels are instead treated in the Cartesian two-dimensional harmonic oscillator basis (with vx and vy quantum numbers), the propensity for only one zero-order bright state (in the Cartesian basis) is restored, and the intrapolyad intensities are simple to model, as long as corrections are made for anharmonic interactions. As a result of trans ⇌ cis isomerization in the à state, intrapolyad emission patterns from overtones of ν4′ and ν6′ evolve as quanta of trans bend (ν3′) are added, so the emission intensities are not only relevant to the ground-state acetylene ⇌ vinylidene isomerization, they are also a direct reporter of isomerization in the electronically excited state.

Based on high-level ab initio calculations, we predict the existence of a strong 4 + 4 + optical transition (dav=1.6 D) near 328 nm (T00 = 30460 cm 1 ), analogous to the B 2 + X 2 + violet system, (dav=1.7 D) in the near-ultraviolet spectrum of CN. The lower state of the predicted transition is the lowest-lying state of quartet multiplicity and has been observed previously through its perturbations of the B state. The predicted transition will enable determination of the equilibrium properties of the metastable lowest quartet state of CN. The lowest energy metastable sextet state of CN is also calculated to be quasibound (re=1.76 A, !e = 365 cm 1 ) , and a 6 + 6 + transition, analogous to those for the doublet and quartet multiplicities, is predicted (dav=2.2 D). Investigation of the isoelectronic BO, C 2 , and N + molecules reveals that dierences

Rotational analyses are reported for a number of newly-discovered vibrational levels of the S 1 - trans (A 1 A u ) state of C 2 H 2 . These levels are combinations where the Franck–Condon active ν 2 ′ and ν 3 ′ vibrational modes are excited together with the low-lying bending vibrations, ν 4 ′ and ν 6 ′ . The structures of the bands are complicated by strong a - and b -axis Coriolis coupling, as well as Darling–Dennison resonance for those bands that involve overtones of the bending vibrations. The most interesting result is the strong anharmonicity in the combinations of ν 3 ′ ( trans bend, a g ) and ν 6 ′ (in-plane cis bend, b u ). This anharmonicity presumably represents the approach of the molecule to the trans – cis isomerization barrier, where ab initio results have predicted the transition state to be half-linear, corresponding to simultaneous excitation of ν 3 ′ and ν 6 ′ . The anharmonicity also causes difficulty in the least squares fitting of some of the polyads, because the simple model of Coriolis coupling and Darling–Dennison resonance starts to break down. The effective Darling–Dennison parameter, K 4466 , is found to increase rapidly with excitation of ν 3 ′ , while many small centrifugal distortion terms have had to be included in the least squares fits in order to reproduce the rotational structure correctly. Fermi resonances become important where the K -structures of different polyads overlap, as happens with the 2 1 3 1 B 1 and 3 1 B 3 polyads ( B = 4 or 6). The aim of this work is to establish the detailed vibrational level structure of the S 1 - trans state in order to search for possible S 1 - cis ( 1 A 2 ) levels. This work, along with results from other workers, identifies at least one K sub-level of every single vibrational level expected up to a vibrational energy of 3500 cm −1 .

Rotational analyses are reported for the and bands of the transition of C2H2 near 45,000 cm−1 (+2800 cm−1 relative to T 0) from jet-cooled laser-induced fluorescence spectra. While the band is unperturbed and straightforward to assign, the 11 level is strongly perturbed by interactions with the 21 B 2 polyad, where υ B ′ = υ4′ + υ6′. In order to assign the lines of this band, a population-labelling technique was used, employing an infrared laser to deplete the population in selected ground state rotational levels before probing with the ultraviolet laser. Deperturbation of the 11/21 B 2 interaction leads to the value cm−1 for the fundamental symmetric C–H stretching frequency. Assignments are also reported for the 23 and 1121 levels, completing all assignments of levels containing excitation in only the totally symmetric vibrational modes up to +4500 cm−1. The reassignment of implies that some of currently accepted assignments above 47,000 cm−1 are in error and suggests that the interpretation of some asp...

The making and breaking of bonds in chemical reactions necessarily involve changes in electronic structure. Therefore, measurements of a carefully chosen electronic property can serve as a marker of progress along a reaction coordinate and provide detailed mechanistic information about the reaction. Herein, we demonstrate through high-resolution spectroscopic measurements and high-level ab initio calculations that nuclear quadrupole hyperfine structure (hfs), an indicator of electronic structure, is highly sensitive to the extent of bending excitation in the prototypical HCNQHNCisomerization system. Thus, measurements of hfs show how the nature of a chemical bond is altered when a vibration that is coupled to the isomerization reaction coordinate is excited. Nuclear quadrupole hfs arises from the interaction of a nuclear electric quadrupole moment with the gradient of the electric field at that nucleus. This interaction causes rotational levels to split into multiple components. The magnitude of the splitting is determined by eQq, in which e is the proton charge, Q is the quadrupole moment of the nucleus, and q is the gradient of the electric field (@ 2 V/@z 2 ) at the nucleus. The electric quadrupole moment Q is a measure of the departure of the nuclear charge distribution from spherical symmetry and is nonzero for nuclear spins I � 1. Although Q is constant for a particular nucleus, q can (and generally does) vary in different molecules. These values of q (and hence eQq) report on the local electronic environment of the nucleus, in contrast to Stark effect measurements of the electric dipole moment, [1]

Surface electron ejection by laser-excited metastables (SEELEM) and LIF spectra of acetylene were simultaneously recorded in the regions of the A1Au−X1Σg+ nominal 213142 Ka = 1 ← 00 and 213162 Ka = 1 ← 00 bands near 46 140 cm-1. The upper states of these two bands are separated by only ∼100 cm-1, and the two S1 vibrational levels are known to be strongly mixed by anharmonic and Coriolis interactions. Strikingly different patterns were observed in the SEELEM spectra in the regions of the 213142 and 213162 vibrational levels. Because the equilibrium structure of the T3 electronic state is known to be nonplanar, excitation of ν4 (torsion) and ν6 (antisymmetric in-plane bend) are expected respectively to promote and suppress vibrational overlap between low-lying S1 and T3 vibrational levels. The nearly 50:50 mixed 213142−213162 character of the S1 vibrational levels rules out this simple Franck−Condon explanation for the different appearance of the SEELEM spectra. A simple model is applied to the SEELEM/LIF ...

In this article, a new technique we call Beam Action Spectroscopy via Inelastic Scattering (BASIS) is demonstrated. BASIS takes advantage of the sensitivity of rotational state distributions in a supersonic molecular beam to inelastic scattering within the beam. We exploit BASIS to achieve increased sensitivity in two very different types of experiments. In the first, the UV photodissociation spectrum of OClO is recovered by monitoring intensity changes in the pure rotational transition of a spectator molecule (OCS) downstream from the nozzle, revealing a new vibrational structure in the region between 30,000 and 36,000 cm(-1). In the second, the mid-IR vibrational spectrum of acetylene is recorded simply by monitoring a single pure rotational transition of OCS co-expanded with acetylene. The technique may prove particularly fruitful when an excitation process produces product dark states that are not easily probed by conventional spectroscopy.

We report the observation of eigenstates that embody large-amplitude, local-bending vibrational motion in acetylene by stimulated emission pumping spectroscopy via vibrational levels of the S-1 state involving excitation in the non-totally symmetric bending modes. The N-b = 14 level, lying at 8971.69 cm(-1) (J = 0), is assigned on the basis of degeneracy due to dynamical symmetry breaking in the local-mode limit. The level pattern for the N-b = 16 level, lying at 10218.9 cm(-1), is consistent with expectations for increased separation of l = 0 and 2 vibrational angular momentum components. Increasingly poor agreement between our observations and the predicted positions of these levels highlights the failure of currently available normal mode effective Hamiltonian models to extrapolate to regions of the potential energy surface involving large-amplitude displacement along the acetylene reversible arrow vinylidene isomerization coordinate.

The nuclear quadrupole hyperfine structure of H14N12C and D14N12C has been resolved in the laboratory for the first time using millimeter-wave absorption spectroscopy. The transient species were produced in a pulsed DC discharge nozzle, and Doppler broadening effects were minimized by propagating the millimeter waves coaxially with the supersonic molecular beam. New rest frequencies for the J = 1-0, J = 2-1, and J = 3-2 rotational transitions of the ground vibrational state were determined. The nuclear quadrupole coupling constants derived from the spectra are (eQq)N = 264.5 ± 4.6 kHz for H14N12C and (eQq)N = 294.7 ± 13.1 kHz and (eQq)D = 261.9 ± 14.5 kHz for D14N12C.

A one-dimensional local bend model is used to describe the variation of electronic properties of acetylene in vibrational levels that embody large amplitude local motions on the S0 potential energy surface. Calculations performed at the CCSD(T) and MR-AQCC levels of theory predict an approximately linear dependence of the dipole moment on the number of quanta in either the local bending or local stretching excitation. In the local mode limit, one quantum of stretching excitation in one CH bond leads to an increase of 0.025 D in the dipole moment, and one quantum of bending vibration in the CCH angle leads to an increase of 0.068 D. The use of a one-dimensional model for the local bend is justified by comparison to the well-established polyad model which reveals a decoupling of the large amplitude bending from other degrees of freedom in the range of Nbend = 14-22. We find that the same one-dimensional large amplitude bending motion emerges from two profoundly different representations, a one-dimensional cut through an ab initio, seven-dimensional Hamiltonian and the three-dimensional (l = 0) pure-bending experimentally parametrized spectroscopic Hamiltonian.

We demonstrate that the gauche conformation of 1H-nonafluorobutane contains a blue-shifting intramolecular hydrogen bond by recording its 5th overtone spectrum with cavity ringdown spectroscopy and performing electronic structure calculations. The magnitude of the blue-shift is enhanced in the overtone spectrum as compared to the fundamental. The energy difference between the gauche conformer and the lowest energy zigzag conformer is calculated to be 288 cm−1 using density functional theory and determined to be 280 ± 30 cm−1 using temperature-dependent FTIR measurements. The –H⋯F– bonding interaction in the gauche conformer leads to changes in bond lengths as compared to the non-hydrogen bonded conformers.

Isomerization between the cis and trans conformers of the S(1) state of acetylene is studied using a reduced dimension discrete variable representation (DVR) calculation. Existing DVR techniques are combined with a high accuracy potential energy surface and a kinetic energy operator derived from FG theory to yield an effective but simple Hamiltonian for treating large amplitude motions. The spectroscopic signatures of the S(1) isomerization are discussed, with emphasis on the vibrational aspects. The presence of a low barrier to isomerization causes distortion of the trans vibrational level structure and the appearance of nominally electronically forbidden à (1)A(2)←X̃ (1)Σ(g)(+) transitions to vibrational levels of the cis conformer. Both of these effects are modeled in agreement with experimental results, and the underlying mechanisms of tunneling and state mixing are elucidated by use of the calculated vibrational wavefunctions.

Surface electron ejection by laser-excited metastables (SEELEM) and LIF spectra of acetylene were simultaneously recorded in the regions of the A1Au-X1Sigmag+ nominal 2(1)3(1)4(2) Ka=1--00 and 2(1)3(1)6(2) Ka=1--00 bands near 46,140 cm(-1). The upper states of these two bands are separated by only approximately 100 cm(-1), and the two S1 vibrational levels are known to be strongly mixed by anharmonic and Coriolis interactions. Strikingly different patterns were observed in the SEELEM spectra in the regions of the 2(1)3(1)4(2) and 2(1)3(1)6(2) vibrational levels. Because the equilibrium structure of the T3 electronic state is known to be nonplanar, excitation of nu4 (torsion) and nu6 (antisymmetric in-plane bend) are expected respectively to promote and suppress vibrational overlap between low-lying S1 and T3 vibrational levels. The nearly 50:50 mixed 2(1)3(1)4(2)-2(1)3(1)6(2) character of the S1 vibrational levels rules out this simple Franck-Condon explanation for the different appearance of the SEELEM spectra. A simple model is applied to the SEELEM/LIF spectra to explain the differences between spectral patterns in terms of a T3 doorway-mediated singlet-triplet coupling model.

The A1A" state of isocyanogen, CNCN, is observed using photofragment fluorescence excitation spectroscopy in a room temperature cell and in a molecular beam. The spectra are highly congested, but progressions that correspond to the Franck-Condon active C-N-C bending vibration in the excited state are evident. Linewidth measurements indicate that the excited state lifetime is10 ps. These measurements are consistent with previous ab initio calculations, which predicted a bent excited state with a short lifetime due to predissociation. Although we do not believe that we have observed the origin band of the electronic transition, we place an upper limit of 42,523 cm(-1) on the energy of the excited state zero point level.

We have recorded the vibrational absorption spectrum of 1,1,1,2-tetrafluoroethane (HFC-134a) in the fundamental and first five CH-stretching overtone regions with the use of Fourier transform infrared, dispersive long-path, intracavity laser photoacoustic, and cavity ringdown spectroscopies. We compare our measured total oscillator strengths in each region with intensities calculated using an anharmonic oscillator local mode model. We calculate intensities with 1D, 2D, and 3D Hamiltonians, including one or two CH stretches and two CH stretches with the HCH bending mode, respectively. The dipole moment function is calculated ab initio with self-consistent-field Hartree-Fock and density functional theories combined with double- and triple-zeta-quality basis sets. We find that the basis set choice affects the total intensity more than the choice of the Hamiltonian. We achieve agreement between the calculated and measured total intensities of approximately a factor of 2 or better for the fundamental and first five overtones.

We report a new form of microwave optical double-resonance spectroscopy called millimeter-wave-detected, millimeter-wave optical polarization spectroscopy (mmOPS). In contrast to other forms of polarization spectroscopy, in which the polarization rotation of optical beams is detected, the mmOPS technique is based on the polarization rotation of millimeter waves induced by the anisotropy from optical pumping out of the lower or upper levels of the millimeter wave transition. By monitoring ground-state rotational transitions with the millimeter waves, the mmOPS technique is capable of identifying weak or otherwise difficult-to-observe optical transitions in complex chemical environments, where multiple molecular species or vibrational states can lead to spectral congestion. Once a transition is identified, mmOPS can then be used to record pure rotational transitions in vibrationally and electronically excited states, with the resolution limited only by the radiative decay rate. Here, the sensitivity of this nearly-background-free technique is demonstrated by optically pumping the weak, nominally spin-forbidden CS e (3)Sigma(-)-X (1)Sigma(+) (2-0) and d (3)Delta-X (1)Sigma(+) (6-0) electronic transitions while probing the CS X (1)Sigma(+) (v(")=0,J(")=2-1) rotational transition with millimeter waves. The J(')=2,N(')=2--J(')=1,N(')=1 pure rotational transition of the CS e (3)Sigma(-) (v(')=2) state is then recorded by optically preparing the J(')=1,N(')=1 level of the e (3)Sigma(-) (v(')=2) state via the J(')=1,N(')=1--J(")=1 transition of the e (3)Sigma(-)-X (1)Sigma(+) (2-0) band.

Chirped-pulse millimeter-wave (CPmmW) spectroscopy is the first broadband (multi-GHz in each shot) Fourier-transform technique for high-resolution survey spectroscopy in the millimeter-wave region. The design is based on chirped-pulse Fourier-transform microwave (CP-FTMW) spectroscopy [G. G. Brown, B. C. Dian, K. O. Douglass, S. M. Geyer, S. T. Shipman, and B. H. Pate, Rev. Sci. Instrum. 79, 053103 (2008)], which is described for frequencies up to 20 GHz. We have built an instrument that covers the 70-102 GHz frequency region and can acquire up to 12 GHz of spectrum in a single shot. Challenges to using chirped-pulse Fourier-transform spectroscopy in the millimeter-wave region include lower achievable sample polarization, shorter Doppler dephasing times, and problems with signal phase stability. However, these challenges have been partially overcome and preliminary tests indicate a significant advantage over existing millimeter-wave spectrometers in the time required to record survey spectra. Further improvement to the sensitivity is expected as more powerful broadband millimeter-wave amplifiers become affordable. The ability to acquire broadband Fourier-transform millimeter-wave spectra enables rapid measurement of survey spectra at sufficiently high resolution to measure diagnostically important electronic properties such as electric and magnetic dipole moments and hyperfine coupling constants. It should also yield accurate relative line strengths across a broadband region. Several example spectra are presented to demonstrate initial applications of the spectrometer.

A systematic analysis of the S(1)-trans (Ã(1)A(u)) state of acetylene, using IR-UV double resonance along with one-photon fluorescence excitation spectra, has allowed assignment of at least part of every single vibrational state or polyad up to a vibrational energy of 4200 cm(-1). Four observed vibrational levels remain unassigned, for which no place can be found in the level structure of the trans-well. The most prominent of these lies at 46 175 cm(-1). Its (13)C isotope shift, exceptionally long radiative lifetime, unexpected rotational selection rules, and lack of significant Zeeman effect, combined with the fact that no other singlet electronic states are expected at this energy, indicate that it is a vibrational level of the S(1)-cis isomer (Ã(1)A(2)). Guided by ab initio calculations [J. H. Baraban, A. R. Beck, A. H. Steeves, J. F. Stanton, and R. W. Field, J. Chem. Phys. 134, 244311 (2011)] of the cis-well vibrational frequencies, the vibrational assignments of these four levels can be established from their vibrational symmetries together with the (13)C isotope shift of the 46 175 cm(-1) level (assigned here as cis-3(1)6(1)). The S(1)-cis zero-point level is deduced to lie near 44 900 cm(-1), and the ν(6) vibrational frequency of the S(1)-cis well is found to be roughly 565 cm(-1); these values are in remarkably good agreement with the results of recent ab initio calculations. The 46 175 cm(-1) vibrational level is found to have a 3.9 cm(-1) staggering of its K-rotational structure as a result of quantum mechanical tunneling through the isomerization barrier. Such tunneling does not give rise to ammonia-type inversion doubling, because the cis and trans isomers are not equivalent; instead the odd-K rotational levels of a given vibrational level are systematically shifted relative to the even-K rotational levels, leading to a staggering of the K-structure. These various observations represent the first definite assignment of an isomer of acetylene that was previously thought to be unobservable, as well as the first high resolution spectroscopic results describing cis-trans isomerization.