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We present an ab initio molecular dynamics study of deprotonation of sulfuric acid on wet quartz, a topic of atmospheric interest. The process is preferred, with 65% of our trajectories at 250 K showing deprotonation. The time distribution of the deprotonation events shows an exponential behavior and predicts an average deprotonation time of a few picoseconds. The process is exoergic, with most of the temperature increase being due to formation of hydrogen bonds prior to deprotonation. In agreement with existing studies of H2SO4 in water clusters, in liquid water, and at the air-water interface, the main determinant of deprotonation is the degree of solvation of H2SO4 by neighboring water molecules. However, we find that if both hydrogens of H2SO4 are simultaneously donated to water oxygens, deprotonation is disfavored. Predicted spectroscopic signatures showing the presence of solvated hydronium and bisulfate are presented. Increasing the temperature up to 330 K accelerates the process but does not change the main features of the deprotonation mechanisms or the spectroscopic signatures. The second deprotonation of H2SO4, studied only at 250 K, occurs provided there is sufficient solvation of the bisulfate by additional water molecules. In comparison to HCl deprotonation on the identical surface examined in our previous work, the first deprotonation of H2SO4 occurs more readily and releases more energy.

We present an ab initio molecular dynamics study of deprotonation of sulfuric acid on wet quartz, a topic of atmospheric interest. The process is preferred, with 65% of our trajectories at 250 K showing deprotonation. The time distribution of the deprotonation events shows an exponential behavior and predicts an average deprotonation time of a few picoseconds. The process is exoergic, with most of the temperature increase being due to formation of hydrogen bonds prior to deprotonation. In agreement with existing studies of H2SO4 in water clusters, in liquid water, and at the air-water interface, the main determinant of deprotonation is the degree of solvation of H2SO4 by neighboring water molecules. However, we find that if both hydrogens of H2SO4 are simultaneously donated to water oxygens, deprotonation is disfavored. Predicted spectroscopic signatures showing the presence of solvated hydronium and bisulfate are presented. Increasing the temperature up to 330 K accelerates the process but does not change the main features of the deprotonation mechanisms or the spectroscopic signatures. The second deprotonation of H2SO4, studied only at 250 K, occurs provided there is sufficient solvation of the bisulfate by additional water molecules. In comparison to HCl deprotonation on the identical surface examined in our previous work, the first deprotonation of H2SO4 occurs more readily and releases more energy.

The interaction of water, 1,4 dioxane, and gaseous nitrogen dioxide, has been studied as a function of distance measured through the liquid-vapour interface by Raman spectroscopy with a narrow (

The interaction of water, 1,4 dioxane, and gaseous nitrogen dioxide, has been studied as a function of distance measured through the liquid-vapour interface by Raman spectroscopy with a narrow (<0.1 mm) laser beam directed parallel to the interface. The Raman spectra show that water is present at the surface of a dioxane-water mixture when gaseous NO2 is absent, but is virtually absent from the surface of a dioxane-water mixture when gaseous NO2 is present. This is consistent with recent theoretical calculations that show NO2 to be mildly hydrophobic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We applied the self-consistent polarization density functional theory (SCP-DFT) to water. SCP-DFT requires only minimal parametrization, self-consistently includes the dispersion interaction neglected by standard DFT functionals, and has a cost similar to standard DFT despite its improved performance. Compared to the DFT functionals BLYP and BLYP-D (where the latter contains a simple dispersion correction), SCP-DFT yields interaction energies per molecule and harmonic frequencies of clusters in better agreement with experiment, with errors in the former of only a few tenths of a kcal/mol. BLYP and BLYP-D underbind and overbind the clusters, respectively, by up to about 1 kcal/mol. For liquid water, both BLYP and SCP-DFT predict radial distribution functions that are similar and overstructured compared to experiment. However, SCP-DFT improves over BLYP in predicting the experimental enthalpy of vaporization. A decomposition of the dimer interaction energy attempts to rationalize the performance of SCP-DFT. The SCP-DFT approach holds promise as an efficient and accurate method for describing large hydrogen-bonded systems, and has the potential to model complex systems with minimal parametrization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present a rigorous theoretical study of the solvation of (HCl)2 and (HF)2 by small (4He)n clusters, with n=1–14 and 30. Pairwise-additive potential-energy surfaces of Hen(HX)2 (X=Cl and F) clusters are constructed from highly accurate four-dimensional (rigid monomer) HX–HX and two-dimensional (rigid monomer) He–HX potentials and a one-dimensional He–He potential. The minimum-energy geometries of these clusters, for n=1–6 in the case of (HCl)2 and n=1–5 for (HF)2, correspond to the He atoms in a ring perpendicular to and bisecting the HX–HX axis. The quantum-mechanical ground-state energies and vibrationally averaged structures of Hen(HCl)2 (n=1–14 and 30) and Hen(HF)2 (n=1–10) clusters are calculated exactly using the diffusion Monte Carlo (DMC) method. In addition, the interchange-tunneling splittings of Hen(HCl)2 clusters with n=1–14 are determined using the fixed-node DMC approach, which was employed by us previously to calculate the tunneling splittings for Hen(HF)2 clusters, n=1–10 [A. Sarsa et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 88, 123401 (2002)]. The vibrationally averaged structures of Hen(HX)2 clusters with n=1–6 for (HCl)2 and n=1–5 for (HF)2 have the helium density localized in an effectively one-dimensional ring, or doughnut, perpendicular to and at the midpoint of the HX–HX axis. The rigidity of the solvent ring varies with n and reaches its maximum for the cluster size at which the ring is filled, n=6 and n=5 for (HCl)2 and (HF)2, respectively. Once the equatorial ring is full, the helium density spreads along the HX–HX axis, eventually solvating the entire HX dimer. The interchange-tunneling splitting of Hen(HCl)2 clusters hardly varies at all over the cluster size range considered, n=1–14, and is virtually identical to that of the free HCl dimer. This absence of the solvent effect is in sharp contrast with our earlier results for Hen(HF)2 clusters, which show a ∼30% reduction of the tunneling splitting for n=4. A tentative explanation for this difference is proposed. The implications of our results for the interchange-tunneling dynamics of (HCl)2 in helium nanodroplets are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A two-dimensional (rigid monomer) intermolecular potential energy surface (PES) of the He–HCl complex has been obtained from ab initio calculations utilizing the symmetry-adapted perturbation theory (SAPT) and an spdfg basis set including midbond functions. The bond length in HCl was chosen to be equal to the expectation value in the ground vibrational state of isolated HCl. The rigid-monomer potential should be a very good approximation to the complete (three-dimensional) potential for H–Cl distances corresponding to the lowest vibrational levels of the monomer since the He–HCl interaction energy was found to be only weakly dependent on the HCl bond length in this region, at least as compared to systems such as Ar–HF. The calculated points were fitted using an analytic function with ab initio computed asymptotic coefficients. As expected, the complex is loosely bound, with the dispersion energy providing the majority of the attraction. Our SAPT PES agrees with the semiempirical PES of Willey et al. [J. Chem. Phys. 96, 898 (1992)], in finding that, atypically for rare gas–hydrogen halide complexes including the lighter halide atoms, the global minimum is on the Cl side (with intermonomer separation 3.35 Å and depth of 32.8 cm-1), rather than on the H side, where there is only a local minimum (3.85 Å, 30.8 cm-1). The ordering of the minima was confirmed by single-point calculations in larger basis sets and complete basis set extrapolations, and also using higher levels of theory. We show that the opposite findings in the recent calculations of Zhang and Shi [J. Mol. Struct: THEOCHEM 589, 89 (2002)] are due to the lack of midbond functions in their basis set. Despite the closeness in depth of the two linear minima, the existence of a relatively high barrier between them invalidates the assumption of isotropy, a feature of some literature potentials. The trends concerning the locations of minima within the family of rare gas–hydrogen halide complexes are rationalized in terms of the physical components of the intermolecular forces and related to monomer properties. The accuracy of the SAPT PES was tested by performing calculations of rovibrational levels. The transition frequencies obtained were found to be in excellent agreement (to within 0.02 cm-1) with the measurements of Lovejoy and Nesbitt [J. Chem. Phys. 93, 5387 (1990)]. The SAPT PES predicts a dissociation energy for the complex of 7.74 cm-1 which is probably more accurate than the experimental value of 10.1±1.2 cm-1. Our analysis of the ground-state rovibrational wave function shows that the He–HCl configuration is favored over the He–ClH configuration despite the ordering of minima. This is due to the greater volume of the well in the former case. We have also determined positions and widths of three low-lying resonance states through scattering calculations. These predictions are expected to be more accurate than values derived from experiment.© 2004 American Institute of Physics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A potential energysurface for the water dimer with explicit dependenceon monomer coordinates is presented. The surface was fitted to a setof previously published interaction energies computed on a grid ofover a quarter million points in the 12-dimensional configurationalspace using symmetry-adapted perturbation theory and coupled-clustermethods. The present fit removes small errors in published fits, andits accuracy is critically evaluated. The minimum and saddle-pointstructures of the potential surface were found to be very close topredictions from direct ab initio optimizations. The computed secondvirial coefficients agreed well with experimental values. At low temperatures,the effects of monomer flexibility in the virial coefficients werefound to be much smaller than the quantum effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present an ab initio molecular dynamics study of deprotonation of sulfuric acid on wet quartz, a topic of atmospheric interest. The process is preferred, with 65% of our trajectories at 250 K showing deprotonation. The time distribution of the deprotonation events shows an exponential behavior and predicts an average deprotonation time of a few picoseconds. The process is exoergic, with most of the temperature increase being due to formation of hydrogen bonds prior to deprotonation. In agreement with existing studies of H2SO4 in water clusters, in liquid water, and at the air–water interface, the main determinant of deprotonation is the degree of solvation of H2SO4 by neighboring water molecules. However, we find that if both hydrogens of H2SO4 are simultaneously donated to water oxygens, deprotonation is disfavored. Predicted spectroscopic signatures showing the presence of solvated hydronium and bisulfate are presented. Increasing the temperature up to 330 K accelerates the process but does not change the main features of the deprotonation mechanisms or the spectroscopic signatures. The second deprotonation of H2SO4, studied only at 250 K, occurs provided there is sufficient solvation of the bisulfate by additional water molecules. In comparison to HCl deprotonation on the identical surface examined in our previous work, the first deprotonation of H2SO4 occurs more readily and releases more energy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We have applied an efficient electronic structure approach, the semiempirical self-consistent polarization neglect of diatomic differential overlap (SCP-NDDO) method, previously parametrized to reproduce properties of water clusters by Chang, Schenter, and Garrett [J. Chem. Phys. 2008, 128, 164111] and now implemented in the CP2K package, to model ambient liquid water at 300 K (both the bulk and the liquid-vapor interface) and cubic ice at 15 and 250 K. The SCP-NDDO potential retains its transferability and good performance across the full range of conditions encountered in the clusters and the bulk phases of water. In particular, we obtain good results for the density, radial distribution functions, enthalpy of vaporization, self-diffusion coefficient, molecular dipole moment distribution, and hydrogen bond populations, in comparison to experimental measurements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An ab initio potential has been developed for the argon dimer. This potential is based on coupled-cluster calculations with single, double, and non-iterated triple excitations in a sequence of very large basis sets, up to augmented sextuple-zeta quality and containing bond functions, followed by extrapolations to the complete basis set limit. The calculations included intermolecular distances as small as 0.25&ThickSpace;Å, where the interaction potential is of the order of 4&ThickSpace;keV. The computed points were fitted by an analytic expression. The new potential has the minimum at 3.767&ThickSpace;Å with a depth of 99.27&ThickSpace;cm -1 respectively, very close to experimental values of 3.761&ThickSpace;±&ThickSpace;0.003&ThickSpace;Å and 99.2&ThickSpace;±&ThickSpace;1.0&ThickSpace;cm -1 respectively. The potential was used to compute the spectra of the argon dimer and the virial coefficients. The latter calculations suggest a possible revision of the established experimental reference results. From the agreement achieved with experimental values and from comparisons of the fit with available piecewise information on specific regions of the argon–argon interaction, one can assume that the present work provides the best overall representation of the true argon–argon potential to date. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present a rigorous theoretical study of the solvation of (HCl)(2) and (HF)(2) by small ((4)He)(n) clusters, with n=1-14 and 30. Pairwise-additive potential-energy surfaces of He(n)(HX)(2) (X=Cl and F) clusters are constructed from highly accurate four-dimensional (rigid monomer) HX-HX and two-dimensional (rigid monomer) He-HX potentials and a one-dimensional He-He potential. The minimum-energy geometries of these clusters, for n=1-6 in the case of (HCl)(2) and n=1-5 for (HF)(2), correspond to the He atoms in a ring perpendicular to and bisecting the HX-HX axis. The quantum-mechanical ground-state energies and vibrationally averaged structures of He(n)(HCl)(2) (n=1-14 and 30) and He(n)(HF)(2) (n=1-10) clusters are calculated exactly using the diffusion Monte Carlo (DMC) method. In addition, the interchange-tunneling splittings of He(n)(HCl)(2) clusters with n=1-14 are determined using the fixed-node DMC approach, which was employed by us previously to calculate the tunneling splittings for He(n)(HF)(2) clusters, n=1-10 [A. Sarsa et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 88, 123401 (2002)]. The vibrationally averaged structures of He(n)(HX)(2) clusters with n=1-6 for (HCl)(2) and n=1-5 for (HF)(2) have the helium density localized in an effectively one-dimensional ring, or doughnut, perpendicular to and at the midpoint of the HX-HX axis. The rigidity of the solvent ring varies with n and reaches its maximum for the cluster size at which the ring is filled, n=6 and n=5 for (HCl)(2) and (HF)(2), respectively. Once the equatorial ring is full, the helium density spreads along the HX-HX axis, eventually solvating the entire HX dimer. The interchange-tunneling splitting of He(n)(HCl)(2) clusters hardly varies at all over the cluster size range considered, n=1-14, and is virtually identical to that of the free HCl dimer. This absence of the solvent effect is in sharp contrast with our earlier results for He(n)(HF)(2) clusters, which show a approximately 30% reduction of the tunneling splitting for n=4. A tentative explanation for this difference is proposed. The implications of our results for the interchange-tunneling dynamics of (HCl)(2) in helium nanodroplets are discussed.