Born-Oppenheimer approximation electron transfer processes

The effects of deviations from the Born-Oppenheimer approximation (BOA) due to the interaction of the electron in the sub-barrier region with the local vibrations of the donor or the acceptor were considered for electron transfer processes in Ref. 68. It was shown that these effects are of importance for long-distance electron transfer since in this case the time when the electron is in the sub-barrier region may be long as compared to the period of the local vibration.68 A similar approach has been used in Ref. 65 to treat non-adiabatic effects in the sub-barrier region in atom transfer processes. However, nonadiabatic effects in the classically attainable region may also be of importance in atom transfer processes. In the harmonic approximation, when these effects are taken into account exactly, they manifest themselves in the noncoincidence of the... 

While studies of specific acid catalysis of redox cofactors shed light on the intricacies of the electron transfer process [54], the conditions required for preprotonation of the cofactor are highly acidic (pH < 0), and would not generally be found in biological systems. There are, however, systems such as Qb reduction in the Rhodobacter sphaeroides reaction center [55], where kinetic data indicate proton transfer prior to or simultaneous with electron transfer. This would seem to indicate that a general acid process is operative. At first glance, this sort of mechanism would seem to be contrary to the Born-Oppenheimer approximation. This apparent paradox can be avoided, however, if quantum chemical (nonadiabatic) processes are considered. 

The material in this chapter is largely organized around the molecular properties that contribute to electron transfer processes in simple transition metal complexes. To some degree these molecular properties can be classified as functions of either (i) the nuclear coordinates (i.e., properties that depend on the spatial orientation and separation, and the vibrational characteristics) of the electron transfer system or (ii) the electronic coordinates of the system (orbital and spin properties). This partitioning of the physical parameters of the system into nuclear and electronic contributions, based on the Born-Oppenheimer approximation, is not rigorous and even in this approximation the electronic coordinates are a function of the nuclear coordinates. The types of systems that conform to expectation at the weak coupling limit will be discussed after some necessary preliminaries and discussion of formalisms. Applications to more complex, extended systems are mentioned at the end of the chapter. 

The treatments of electron transfer processes by Marcus and by Levich and Dogonadze recognize that the behaviour of the system can be described by using the Born-Oppenheimer approximation to separate the Hamiltonian into two parts ... 

Nonadiabatic dynamics is a quantum phenomenon which occurs in systems that interact sufficiently strongly with their environments to cause a breakdown of the Born-Oppenheimer approximation. Nonadiabatic transitions play significant roles in many chemical processes such as proton and electron transfer events in solution and biological systems, and in the response of molecules to radiation fields and their subsequent relaxation. Since the bath in which the quantum dynamics of interest occurs often consists of relatively heavy molecules, its evolution can be modeled by classical mechanics to a high degree of accuracy. This observation has led to the development of mixed quantum-classical methods for nonadiabatic processes. 

The study of molecular systems using quantum mechanics is based on the Born-Oppenheimer approximation. This approximation relies on the fact that the electrons, because of their smaller mass, move much faster than the heavier nuclei, so they follow the motion of the nuclei adiabatically, whereas the latter move on the average potential of the former. The Born-Oppenheimer approximation is sufficient to describe most chemical processes. In fact, our notion of molecular structure is based on the Born-Oppenheimer approximation, because the molecular structure is formed by nuclei being placed in fixed positions. There are, however, essential nonadiabatic processes in nature that cannot be described within this approximation. Nonadiabatic processes are ubiquitous in photophysics and photochemistry, and they govern such important phenomena as photosynthesis, vision, and charge-transfer reactions. 

Diabatic states are obtained from a similar approach, except that additional term (or terms) in the Hamiltonian are disregarded in order to adopt a specific physical picture. For example, suppose we want to describe a process where an electron e is transferred between two centers of attraction, A and B, of a molecular systems. We may choose to work in a basis of vibronic states obtained for the e-A system in the absence of e-B attraction, and for the e-B system in the absence of the e-A attraction. To get these vibronic states we again use a Born-Oppenheimer procedure as described above. The potential surfaces for the nuclear motion obtained in this approximation are the corresponding diabatic potentials. By the nature of the approximation made, these potentials will correspond to electronic states that describe an electron localized on A or on B, and electron transfer between centers A and B implies that the system has crossed from one diabatic potential surface to the other. 

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