Dielectric reaction field

Onsager s original reaction field method imposes some serious lunitations the description of the solute as a point dipole located at the centre of a cavity, the spherical fonn of the cavity and the assumption that cavity size and solute dipole moment are independent of the solvent dielectric constant. 

In the reaction field method, the space surrounding a dipolar molecule is divided into two regions (i) a cavity, within which electrostatic interactions are sunnned explicitly, and (ii) a surrounding medium, which is assumed to act like a smooth continuum, and is assigned a dielectric constant e. Ideally, this quantity will be... 

Gray C G, Sainger Y S, Joslin C G, Cummings P T and Goldman S 1986 Computer simulation of dipolar fluids. Dependence of the dielectric constant on system size a comparative study of Ewald sum and reaction field approaches J. Chem. Phys. 85 1502-4... 

The same idea was actually exploited by Neumann in several papers on dielectric properties [52, 69, 70]. Using a tin-foil reaction field the relation between the (frequency-dependent) relative dielectric constant e(tj) and the autocorrelation function of the total dipole moment M t] becomes particularly simple ... 

In the reaction field method, a sphere is constructed around the molecule with a radius equal to the cutoff distance. The interaction with molecules that are within the sphere is calculated explicitly. To this is added the energy of interaction with the medium beyond the sphere, which is rnodelled as a homogeneous medium of dielectric constant g (Figure 6.23). The electrostatic field due to the surrounding dielectric is given by ... 

Another variant that may mrn out to be the method of choice performs the alchemical free energy simulation with a spherical model surrounded by continuum solvent, neglecting portions of the macromolecule that lie outside the spherical region. The reaction field due to the outer continuum is easily included, because the model is spherical. Additional steps are used to change the dielectric constant of that portion of the macromolecule that lies in the outer region from its usual low value to the bulk solvent value (before the alchemical simulation) and back to its usual low value (after the alchemical simulation) the free energy for these steps can be obtained from continuum electrostatics [58]. 

The continuum model, in which solvent is regarded as a continuum dielectric, has been used to study solvent effects for a long time [2,3]. Because the electrostatic interaction in a polar system dominates over other forces such as van der Waals interactions, solvation energies can be approximated by a reaction field due to polarization of the dielectric continuum as solvent. Other contributions such as dispersion interactions, which must be explicitly considered for nonpolar solvent systems, have usually been treated with empirical quantity such as macroscopic surface tension of solvent. 

A variety of methodologies have been implemented for the reaction field. The basic equation for the dielectric continuum model is the Poisson-Laplace equation, by which the electrostatic field in a cavity with an arbitrary shape and size is calculated, although some methods do not satisfy the equation. Because the solute s electronic strucmre and the reaction field depend on each other, a nonlinear equation (modified Schrddinger equation) has to be solved in an iterative manner. In practice this is achieved by modifying the electronic Hamiltonian or Fock operator, which is defined through the shape and size of the cavity and the description of the solute s electronic distribution. If one takes a dipole moment approximation for the solute s electronic distribution and a spherical cavity (Onsager s reaction field), the interaction can be derived rather easily and an analytical expression of theFock operator is obtained. However, such an expression is not feasible for an arbitrary electronic distribution in an arbitrary cavity fitted to the molecular shape. In this case the Fock operator is very complicated and has to be prepared by a numerical procedure. 

Solvent effects on chemical equilibria and reactions have been an important issue in physical organic chemistry. Several empirical relationships have been proposed to characterize systematically the various types of properties in protic and aprotic solvents. One of the simplest models is the continuum reaction field characterized by the dielectric constant, e, of the solvent, which is still widely used. Taft and coworkers [30] presented more sophisticated solvent parameters that can take solute-solvent hydrogen bonding and polarity into account. Although this parameter has been successfully applied to rationalize experimentally observed solvent effects, it seems still far from satisfactory to interpret solvent effects on the basis of microscopic infomation of the solute-solvent interaction and solvation free energy. 

One femily of models for systems in non-aqueous solution are referred to as Self-Consistent Reaction Field (SCRF) methods. These methods all model the solvent as a continuum of uniform dielectric constant e the reaction field. The solute is placed into a cavity within the solvent. SCRF approachs differ in how they define the cavity and the reaction field. Several are illustrated below. 

A more thorough analysis shows that one should not expect the electric dipole moment to remain constant, because real molecules have polarizability. The polarization of the dielectric in the electric field of the molecule itself gives rise to a reaction field, which tends to enhance the electrical asymmetry. 

The Self-Consistent Reaction Field (SCRF) model considers the solvent as a uniform polarizable medium with a dielectric constant of s, with the solute M placed in a suitable shaped hole in the medium. Creation of a cavity in the medium costs energy, i.e. this is a destabilization, while dispersion interactions between the solvent and solute add a stabilization (this is roughly the van der Waals energy between solvent and solute). The electric charge distribution of M will furthermore polarize the medium (induce charge moments), which in turn acts back on the molecule, thereby producing an electrostatic stabilization. The solvation (free) energy may thus be written as... 

The simplest reaction field model is a spherical cavity, where only the net charge and dipole moment of the molecule are taken into account, and cavity/dispersion effects are neglected. For a net charge in a cavity of radius a, the difference in energy between vacuum and a medium with a dielectric constant of e is given by the Bom model. ... 

Conceptually, the self-consistent reaction field (SCRF) model is the simplest method for inclusion of environment implicitly in the semi-empirical Hamiltonian24, and has been the subject of several detailed reviews24,25,66. In SCRF calculations, the QM system of interest (solute) is placed into a cavity within a polarizable medium of dielectric constant e (Fig. 2.2). For ease of computation, the cavity is assumed to be spherical and have a radius ro, although expressions similar to those outlined below have been developed for ellipsoidal cavities67. Using ideas from classical electrostatics, we can show that the interaction potential can be expressed as a function of the charge and multipole moments of the solute. For ease... 

Fig. 2.2 Self-Consistent Reaction Field (SCRF) model for the inclusion of solvent effects in semi-empirical calculations. The solvent is represented as an isotropic, polarizable continuum of macroscopic dielectric e. The solute occupies a spherical cavity of radius ru, and has a dipole moment of p,o. The molecular dipole induces an opposing dipole in the solvent medium, the magnitude of which is dependent on e.

Since surface charges depend on the electrostatic potential (Eq. 4.20), Eqs. 4.20-4.22 are solved in an iterative way leading to self-consistent surface charges. At the end of this procedure, surface charges and the electrostatic potential satisfy the boundary condition specified in Eq. 4.21. In practical applications, this self-consistent procedure for calculating reaction field potential is coupled to self-consistent procedure which governs solving the Kohn-Sham equations. A special case for infinite dielectric constant outside the cavity... 

Reaction Field the determination of the cavity shape, dielectric constant(s), the method to calculate the reaction field potential, presence of counterions (for finite... 

Marten, B., K. Kim, C. Cortis, R. A. Friesner, R. B. Murphy, M. N. Ringnalda, D. Sitkoff, and B. Honig. 1996. New Model for Calculation of Solvation Free Energies Correction to Self-consistent Reaction Field Continuum Dielectric Theory for Short-Range Hydrogen-Bonding Effects. J. Phys. Chem. 100, 11775. 

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