Energy surface molecular geometry

Potential energy surfaces are important because they aid us in visualizing and understanding the relationship between potential energy and molecular geometry, and in understanding how computational chemistry programs locate and characterize structures... 

Surface crossing In a diagram of electronic energy versus molecular geometry, the electronic energies of two states of different symmetry may be equal at certain geometrical parameters. At this point (unidimensional representation), line or surface (more than one dimension), the two potentialenergy surfaces are said to cross one another. 

For molecules of chemical interest it is not possible to calculate an exact many-electron wave function. As a result, we have to make certain approximations. The most commonly made approximation is the molecular orbital approximation, which is outlined in the next section. Within such a framework, it is useful to define various levels of computational method, each of which can be applied to give a unique wave function and energy for any set of nuclear positions and number of electrons. If such a model is clearly specified and if it is sufficiently simple to apply repeatedly, it can be used to generate molecular potential energy surfaces, equilibrium geometries, and other physical properties. Each such theoretical model can then be explored and the results compared in detail with experiment. If there is sufficient consistent success, some confidence can then be acquired in its predictive power. Each such level of theory therefore should be thoroughly tested and characterized before the significance of its prediction is assessed. 

To calculate the properties of a molecule, you need to generate a well-defined structure. A calculation often requires a structure that represents a minimum on a potential energy surface. HyperChem contains several geometry optimizers to do this. You can then calculate single point properties of a molecule or use the optimized structure as a starting point for subsequent calculations, such as molecular dynamics simulations. 

HyperChem provides three types of potential energy surface sampling algorithms. These are found in the HyperChem Compute menu Single Point, Geometry Optimization, and Molecular Dynamics. 

Geometry optimizations usually attempt to locate minima on the potential energy surface, thereby predicting equilibrium structures of molecular systems. Optimizations can also locate transition structures. However, in this chapter we will focus primarily on optimizing to minima. Optimizations to minima are also called minimizations. 

An IRC calculation examines the reaction path leading down from a transition structure on a potential energy surface. Such a calculation starts at the saddle point and follows the path in both directions from the transition state, optimizing the geometry of the molecular system at each point along the path. In this way, an IRC calculation definitively connects two minima on the potential energy surface by a path which passes through the transition state between them. 

There exist a series of beautiful spectroscopy experiments that have been carried out over a number of years in the Lineberger (1), Brauman (2), and Beauchamp (3) laboratories in which electronically stable negative molecular ions prepared in excited vibrational-rotational states are observed to eject their extra electron. For the anions considered in those experiments, it is unlikely that the anion and neutral-molecule potential energy surfaces undergo crossings at geometries accessed by their vibrational motions in these experiments, so it is believed that the mechanism of electron ejection must involve vibration-rotation... 

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