Translational energy partition function

All calculations will be done for the standard pressure of 1 bar and, unless otherwise noted, at T = 298.15 K for one mole of gas. Table 8.1 lists the calculated molecular partition function, thermal energy (energy in excess of the ground-state energy), heat capacity, and entropy. The individual contributions from translation, rotation, each of the six vibrational modes, and from the first excited electronic energy level are included. 

In the case of water, the situation is complicated because of the anisotropic nature of the potential. Thus, we have effective harmonic potential for translation, rotation, and librational motions. Each is characterized by a force constant and contributes to the partition function, free energy, and entropy. Furthermore, a water molecule can be categorized by the number of HBs it forms. Since these quantities can be considered as thermodynamic, they make a contribution as the entropy of mixing, also known as the cratic contribution. 

The following derivation is modified from that of Fowler and Guggenheim [10,11]. The adsorbed molecules are considered to differ from gaseous ones in that their potential energy and local partition function (see Section XVI-4A) have been modified and that, instead of possessing normal translational motion, they are confined to localized sites without any interactions between adjacent molecules but with an adsorption energy Q. 

Since translational and internal energy (of rotation and vibration) are independent, the partition function for the gas can be written... 

It is now necessary to examine the partition function in more detail. The energy states for translation are assumed to be given by the quantum-mechanical picture of a particle in a box. For a one-dimensional box of length a. 

The total partition function may be approximated to the product of the partition function for each contribution to the heat capacity, that from the translational energy for atomic species, and translation plus rotation plus vibration for the diatomic and more complex species. Defining the partition function, PF, tlrrough the equation... 

C) The error in AE" /AEq is 0.1 kcal/mol. Corrections from vibrations, rotations and translation are clearly necessary. Explicit calculation of the partition functions for anharmonic vibrations and internal rotations may be considered. However, at this point other factors also become important for the activation energy. These include for example ... 

The energy states associated with intermolecular translation and rotation are not only numerous, but also so irregularly spaced that it is impossible to derive them directly from molecular quantities. It is consequently not possible to construct the partition function explicitly. Nevertheless, we may derive formal expressions for U and A from eqs. (16.1) and (16.2). 

We have seen that for the electronic partition function there is no closed form expression (as there is for translation, rotation, and vibration) and one must know the energy and degeneracy of each state. That is. 

MMl represents the mass and moment-of-inertia term that arises from the translational and rotational partition functions EXG, which may be approximated to unity at low temperatures, arises from excitation of vibrations, and finally ZPE is the vibrational zero-point-energy term. The relation between these terms and the isotopic enthalpy and entropy differences may be written... 

Starting with the partition function of translation, consider a particle of mass m moving in one dimension x over a line of length I with velocity v. Its momentum Px = mVx and its kinetic energy = Pxllm. The coordinates available for the particle X, px in phase space can be divided into small cells each of size h, which is Planck s constant. Since the division is so incredibly small we can replace the sum with integration over phase space in x and Px, and so calculate the partition function. By normalizing with the size of the cell h the expression becomes... 

Obviously, the above derivation can be repeated for the other two Cartesian directions. As the energies are additive, the partition function for the three-dimensional translation of the molecule can be written as a product, viz. 

The partition function for one-dimensional translational energies follows as... 

The function g is the partition function for the transition state, and Qr is the product of the partition functions for the reactant molecules. The partition function essentially counts the number of ways that thermal energy can be stored in the various modes (translation, rotation, vibration, etc.) of a system of molecules, and is directly related to the number of quantum states available at each energy. This is related to the freedom of motion in the various modes. From equations 6.5-7 and -16, we see that the entropy change is related to the ratio of the partition functions ... 

An increase in the number of ways to store energy increases the entropy of a system. Thus, an estimate of the pre-exponential factor A in TST requires an estimate of the ratio g /gr. A common approximation in evaluating a partition function is to separate it into contributions from the various modes of energy storage, translational (tr), rotational (rot), and vibrational (vib) ... 

The result (Equation 4.90) could have been derived more simply. It has been emphasized that the quantum mechanical contribution to the partition function ratio arises from the quantization of vibrational energy levels. For the molecular translations and rotations quantization has been ignored because the spacing of translational and rotational energy levels is so close as to be essentially continuous (As/kT 1). 

At high T (low X,), reduces to Il,(l/X,). Because the potential energies of molecules dilfering only in isotopic constituents are alike, one can define a separative elfect based on the partition function ratio / of isotopically heavy and light molecules ((T and Q°, respectively) in such a way that the rotational and translational contributions to the partition function cancel out ... 

A AZPE = AZPEii — AZPEd AZPEt) corresponds to the terms for the reactions of monodeuteriated aldehydes. Terms defined by IE = MMl x EXC x EXP (IE is the Isotopic exchange equilibrium, MMl is the mass moment of inertia term representing the rotational and translational partition function ratios, EXC is the vibrational excitation term and EXP is the exponential zero point energy). 

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