Quasiclassical trajectory study of the dynamics of the H+N[sub 2]O reaction on a new potential energy surface

Multiple-time scale integration method based on an interpolated potential energy surface for ab initio path integral molecular dynamics

A new multiple-time scale integration method is presented that propagates ab initio path integral molecular dynamics (PIMD). This method uses a large time step to generate an approximate geometrical configuration whose energy and gradient are evaluated at the level of an ab initio method, and then, a more precise integration scheme, e.g., the Bulirsch-Stoer method or velocity Verlet integration with a smaller time step, is used to integrate from the previous step using the computationally efficient interpolated potential energy surface constructed from two consecutive points. This method makes the integration of PIMD more efficient and accurate compared with the velocity Verlet integration. A Nosé-Hoover chain thermostat combined with this new multiple-time scale method has good energy conservation even with a large time step, which is usually challenging in velocity Verlet integration for PIMD due to the very small chain mass when a large number of beads are used. The new method is used to calculate infrared spectra and free energy profiles to demonstrate its accuracy and capabilities.

Re-integration with anchor points algorithm for ab initio molecular dynamics

A new integration scheme for ab initio molecular dynamics (MD) is proposed in this work for efficient propagation using large time steps (e.g., 2.0 fs or a larger time step with one ab initio evaluation of gradients for the dynamics point and one additional evaluation for the anchor point per dynamics step). This algorithm is called re-integration with anchor points (REAP) integrator. The REAP integrator starts from a quadratic potential energy surface based on the updated Hessian to propagate the system to the halfway of the MD step that is called the anchor point. Then, an approximate dynamics position for this step is obtained by the propagation based on an interpolated surface using the anchor point and the previous MD point. The approximate dynamics step can be further improved by the re-integration steps, i.e., integration based on the interpolated surface using the calculated energies, gradients, and updated Hessians of the previous step, the anchor point, and the approximate current step. A trajectory only needs one analytical Hessian calculation at the initial geometry, and thereafter, only calculations of gradients are required. This integrator can be considered either as a generalization of Hessian-based predictor-corrector integration with substantial improvement of accuracy and efficiency or as a dynamics on interpolated surfaces that are built on the fly. An automatic correction scheme is implemented by comparing the interpolated energies and gradients to the actual ones to ensure the quality of the interpolations at a certain level. The tests in this work show that the REAP method can increase computational efficiency by more than one order of magnitude than that of the velocity Verlet integrator and more than twice that of Hessian-based predictor-corrector integration.

Reaction of the hydrogen atom with nitrous oxide in aqueous solution – pulse radiolysis and theoretical study

The UB3LYP/cc-pVTZ computations using three solvent models and pulse radiolysis measurements show predominance of the direct reaction path via [H–ONN]^‡ in aqueous solution.

Quasiclassical trajectory study of the SiH(4)+H-->SiH(3)+H(2) reaction on a global ab initio potential energy surface

The SiH(4)+H-->SiH(3)+H(2) reaction has been investigated by the quasiclassical trajectory (QCT) method on a recent global ab initio potential energy surface [M. Wang et al., J. Chem. Phys. 124, 234311 (2006)]. The integral cross section as a function of collision energy and thermal rate coefficient for the temperature range of 300-1600 K have been obtained. At the collision energy of 9.41 kcalmol, product energy distributions and rovibrational populations are explored in detail, and H(2) rotational state distributions show a clear evidence of two reaction mechanisms. One is the conventional rebound mechanism and the other is the stripping mechanism similar to what has recently been found in the reaction of CD(4)+H [J. P. Camden et al., J. Am. Chem. Soc. 127, 11898 (2005)]. The computed rate coefficients with the zero-point energy correction are in good agreement with the available experimental data.

Quasiclassical trajectory study of the Cl+CH4 reaction dynamics on a quadratic configuration interaction with single and double excitation interpolated potential energy surface

An ab initio interpolated potential energy surface (PES) for the Cl+CH(4) reactive system has been constructed using the interpolation method of Collins and co-workers [J. Chem. Phys. 102, 5647 (1995); 108, 8302 (1998); 111, 816 (1999); Theor. Chem. Acc. 108, 313 (2002)]. The ab initio calculations have been performed using quadratic configuration interaction with single and double excitation theory to build the PES. A simple scaling all correlation technique has been used to obtain a PES which yields a barrier height and reaction energy in good agreement with high level ab initio calculations and experimental measurements. Using these interpolated PESs, a detailed quasiclassical trajectory study of integral and differential cross sections, product rovibrational populations, and internal energy distributions has been carried out for the Cl+CH(4) and Cl+CD(4) reactions, and the theoretical results have been compared with the available experimental data. It has been shown that the calculated total reaction cross sections versus collision energy for the Cl+CH(4) and Cl+CD(4) reactions is very sensitive to the barrier height. Besides, due to the zero-point energy (ZPE) leakage of the CH(4) molecule to the reaction coordinate in the quasiclassical trajectory (QCT) calculations, the reaction threshold falls below the barrier height of the PES. The ZPE leakage leads to CH(3) and HCl coproducts with internal energy below its corresponding ZPEs. We have shown that a Gaussian binning (GB) analysis of the trajectories yields excitation functions in somehow better agreement with the experimental determinations. The HCl(v'=0) and DCl(v'=0) rotational distributions are as well very sensitive to the ZPE problem. The GB correction narrows and shifts the rotational distributions to lower values of the rotational quantum numbers. However, the present QCT rotational distributions are still hotter than the experimental distributions. In both reactions the angular distributions shift from backward peaked to sideways peaked as collision energy increases, as seen in the experiments and other theoretical calculations.

Quasiclassical Trajectory Study of the F + CH4 Reaction Dynamics on a Dual-Level Interpolated Potential Energy Surface

An ab initio interpolated potential energy surface (PES) for the F + CH4 reactive system has been constructed using the interpolation method of Collins and co-workers. The ab initio calculations have been performed using second-order Möller-Plesset (MP2) perturbation theory to build the initial PES. Scaling all correlation (SAC) methodology has been employed to improve the ab initio calculations and to construct a dual-level PES. Using this PES, a detailed quasiclassical trajectory study of integral and differential cross sections, product rovibrational populations and internal energy distributions has been carried out for the F + CH4 and F + CD4 reactions and the theoretical results have been compared with the available experimental data.

Quasi-classical trajectory study of Si+O2-->SiO+O reaction

Quasi-classical trajectory calculations for the Si(3P)+O2(X 3Sigmag-)-->SiO(X 1Sigma+)+O(1D) reaction have been carried out using the analytical ground 1A' potential energy surface (PES) recently reported by Dayou and Spielfiedel [J. Chem. Phys. 119, 4237 (2003)]. The reaction has been studied for a wide range of collision energies (0.005-0.6 eV) with O2 in its ground rovibrational state. The barrierless PES leads to a decrease of the total reaction cross section with increasing collision energy. It has been brought to evidence that the reaction proceeds through different reaction mechanisms whose contributions to reactivity are highly dependent on the collision energy range. At low collision energy an abstraction mechanism occurs involving the collinear SiOO potential well. The associated short-lived intermediate complex leads to an inverted vibrational distribution peaked at v'=3 and low rotational excitation of SiO(v',j') with a preferentially backward scattering. At higher energies the reaction proceeds mainly through an insertion mechanism involving the bent and linear OSiO deep potential wells and associated long-lived intermediate complexes, giving rise to nearly statistical energy disposals into the product modes and a forward-backward symmetry of the differential cross section.