Hydrogen bonding in supercritical tert-butanol assessed by vibrational spectroscopies and molecular-dynamics simulations

Infrared quantification of ethanol and 1-butanol hydrogen bonded hydroxyl distributions in cyclohexane

Quantifying the mid-range infrared hydroxyl stretch absorbance region has traditionally been a challenge due to the wavenumber dependence of the attenuation coefficient. Interpretation often assigns a single attenuation coefficient to each type of hydrogen-bonded aggregate. This work leverages a recently developed technique of scaling hydroxyl stretching absorbances in the mid-infrared region with a continuous attenuation coefficient function that produces integrated areas which directly correlate to hydroxyl concentrations. After scaling, the hydroxyl absorbance is fitted with five curves, of which four are dominant. These four curves represent unique hydroxyl configurations and translate to specific aggregate structures. The technique is applied to ethanol and 1-butanol. The resulting population distributions of hydrogen-bonded hydroxyl configurations are compared with the resummed thermodynamic perturbation theory (RTPT) model for linear chains as a function of concentration and temperature. The model is demonstrated to capture the critical features of the distributions.

Supramolecular Structure of Phenyl Derivatives of Butanol Isomers

Wide-angle X-ray scattering patterns were recorded for a series of aliphatic butanol isomers (n-, iso-, sec-, tert-butanol) and their phenyl derivatives (4-phenyl-1-butanol, 2-methyl-3-phenyl-1-propanol, 4-phenyl-2-butanol, and 2-methyl-1-phenyl-2-propanol, respectively) to determine their atomic-scale structure with particular emphasis on the formation of supramolecular clusters. In addition, molecular dynamics simulations were carried out and yielded good agreement with experimental data. The combination of experimental and theoretical results allowed clarification of the origin of the pre-peak appearing at low scattering angles for the aliphatic butanols and its absence for their phenyl counterparts. It was demonstrated that the location of the hydroxyl group in the molecule of alkyl butanol, its geometry, and rigidity determine the morphology of the supramolecular clusters, while the addition of the aromatic moiety causes more disordered organization of molecules. The phenyl group significantly decreases the number of hydrogen bonds and size of the supramolecular clusters formed via the O–H···O scheme. The lower association ability of phenyl alcohols via H-bonds is additionally attenuated by the appearance of competing π–π configurations evidenced by the structural models.

Breaking the Structure of Liquid Hydrogenated Alcohols Using Perfluorinated tert-Butanol: A Multitechnique Approach (Infrared, Raman, and X-ray Scattering) Analyzed by DFT and Molecular Dynamics Calculations

The state of aggregation at room temperature of tert-butanol (TBH) and perfluoro tert-butanol (TBF) liquid mixtures is assessed by vibrational spectroscopy (Raman and infrared) and X-ray diffraction and analyzed using density functional theory (DFT) and molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. It is shown that larger clusters (mostly tetramers) of TBH are destroyed upon dilution with TBF. Small oligomers, monomers, and mainly heterodimers are present at the equimolar concentration. At variance with slightly interacting solvents, the signature of hetero-oligomers is shown by the appearance of a new broad band detected in the infrared region. The same spectral observation is detected for mixtures of other hydrogenated alcohols (methanol and 1-butanol). The new infrared feature is unaffected by dilution in a polar solvent (CDCl₃) in a high-concentration domain, allowing us to assign it to the signature of small hetero-oligomers. MD simulations are used to assess the nature of the species present in the mixture (monomers and small hetero-oligomers) and to follow the evolution of their population upon the dilution. Combining MD simulations with DFT calculations, the infrared spectral profile is successfully analyzed in equimolecular mixtures. This study shows that TBF is a structure breaker of hydrogen-bonded alcohol networks and that the TBF (donor)-TBH (acceptor) heterodimer is the dominant species in an extended range of concentration, centered in the vicinity of the equimolar fraction.

Theoretical and Experimental Study of the Excess Thermodynamic Properties of Highly Nonideal Liquid Mixtures of Butanol Isomers + DBE

Binary alcohol + ether liquid mixtures are of significant importance as potential biofuels or additives for internal combustion engines and attract considerable fundamental interest as model systems containing one strongly H-bonded self-associating component (alcohol) and one that is unable to do so (ether), but that can interact strongly as a H-bond acceptor. In this context, the excess thermodynamic properties of these mixtures, specifically the excess molar enthalpies and volumes (H^E and V^E), have been extensively measured. Butanol isomer + di-n-butyl ether (DBE) mixtures received significant attention because of interesting differences in their V^E, changing from negative (1- and isobutanol) to positive (2- and tert-butanol) with increasing alkyl group branching. With the aim of shedding light on the differences in alcohol self-association and cross-species H-bonding, considered responsible for the observed differences, we studied representative 1- and 2-butanol + DBE mixtures by molecular dynamics simulations and experimental excess property measurements. The simulations reveal marked differences in the self-association of the two isomers and, while supporting the existing interpretations of the H^E and V^E in a general sense, our results suggest, for the first time, that subtle changes in H-bonded topologies may contribute significantly to the anomalous volumetric properties of these mixtures.

Is the Fourier Transform Infrared Free-OH Band of t-Butanol Only from Free OHs? Case Studies on the Binary Systems of the Alcohol with CCl4 and CHCl3

Attenuated total reflection-Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy and quantum chemical calculations were performed on tert-butyl alcohol (t-BuOH) and its binary solutions with CCl₄ and CHCl₃. The study was focused on the free-OH stretching bands. Two resolution-enhancing methods, excess spectroscopy and two-dimensional correlation spectroscopy, were employed to examine the structural heterogeneity and search for the detailed contributors to the free-OH bands. Unexpectedly, CCl₄ was found not to be an inert solvent and, similar to CHCl₃, formed hydrogen/halogen bonds (H-/X-bond) with t-BuOH. It was observed that the free-OH band in the t-BuOH-CHCl₃ system is larger and more red-shifted than that in the t-BuOH-CCl₄ system, indicating the stronger intermolecular interactions in the former system. Furthermore, in the t-BuOH-CHCl₃ system, the H-bonds are stronger than the X-bonds, while in the t-BuOH-CCl₄ system, both interactions are similar in strength. To assign the free-OH bands, it was found that they are not only from the free OH of the t-BuOH monomer, but they are also contributed by the quasi-free OH with the oxygen bonded to H or Cl and even the weakly H-bonded OH of t-BuOH molecules. Finally, all the identified species increased simultaneously via cosolvent addition, suggestive of the destabilization of the highly associated t-BuOH clusters.

Quantitative Analysis of Infrared Spectra of Binary Alcohol + Cyclohexane Solutions with Quantum Chemical Calculations

Hydrogen bonding has profound effects on the behavior of molecules. Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy is the technique most commonly used to qualitatively identify hydrogen-bonding moieties present in a chemical sample. However, quantitative analysis of infrared (IR) spectra is nontrivial for the hydroxyl stretching region where hydrogen bonding is most prominently expressed in organic alcohols and water. Specifically, the breadth and extreme overlap of the O-H stretching bands, and the order of magnitude variability of their IR attenuation coefficients complicates the analysis. In the present work, sequential molecular dynamics simulations and quantum mechanical calculations are used to develop a function to relate the integrated IR attenuation coefficient to the vibrational frequencies of hydroxyl bands across the O-H stretching region. This relationship is then used as a guide to develop an attenuation coefficient scaling function to quantitatively determine concentrations of alcohols in a hydrocarbon solution from experimental IR spectra by integration across the entire hydroxyl frequency range.

Water-Methanol Mixtures: Simulations of Mixing Properties over the Entire Range of Mole Fractions

Numerous experimental and theoretical investigations have been devoted to the hydrogen bond in pure liquids and mixtures. Among the different theoretical approaches, molecular dynamics (MD) simulations are predominant in obtaining detailed information, on the molecular level, simultaneously on the structure and the dynamics. Water and methanol are the two most prominent hydrogen-bonded liquids, and they and their mixtures have consequently been the subject of many studies; we revisit here the problem of the mixtures. An important first step is to check whether a classical potential model, the components of which are deemed to be satisfactory for the pure liquids, is able to reproduce the known thermodynamic excess properties of the mixtures sufficiently well. We have used the available BJH (water) and PHH (methanol) flexible models because they are by construction mutually compatible and also well suited to study, in a second step, some dynamic property characteristic of hydrogen-bonded liquids. In this article we show that these models, after a slight reparametrization for use in NpT simulations, reproduce the essential features of the excess mixing and molar properties of water-methanol mixtures. Furthermore, in the pure liquids, the agreement of the radial distribution functions with experiment remains as satisfactory as before. Similarly, the translation self-diffusion coefficients D are modified by less than 10%. In the mixtures, they evolve nonmonotonously as a function of mole fraction.

On the cluster composition of supercritical water combining molecular modeling and vibrational spectroscopic data

The present study is aimed at a detailed analysis of supercritical water structure based on the combination of experimental vibrational spectra as well as molecular modeling calculations of isolated water clusters. We propose an equilibrium cluster composition model where supercritical water is considered as an ideal mixture of small water clusters (n=1-3) at the chemical equilibrium and the vibrational spectra are expected to result from the superposition of the spectra of the individual clusters, Thus, it was possible to extract from the decomposition of the midinfrared spectra the evolution of the partition of clusters in supercritical water as a function of density. The cluster composition predicted by this model was found to be quantitatively consistent with the near infrared and Raman spectra of supercritical water analyzed using the same procedure. We emphasize that such methodology could be applied to determine the portion of cluster in water in a wider thermodynamic range as well as in more complex aqueous supercritical solutions.

Simple in situ monitoring of a complex catalytic reaction network at high pressure by attenuated total reflection Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy

Attenuated total reflection (ATR) Fourier transform infrared (FT-IR) in situ measurements were performed during the catalytic hydrogenation of acetophenone under high pressure (5.0 MPa). The catalyst used was a suspension of rhodium nanoparticles in an ionic liquid. At the highest temperature used (80 degrees C), the selectivity of the hydrogenation to 1-phenylethanol dropped from 80% in the beginning of the reaction, when acetylcyclohexane was the main side product, to less than 50% after a few hours of experiment because of the consecutive hydrogenation of 1-phenylethanol to ethylcyclohexane. The evolution of the concentrations of reactant and products was quantified using flawless spectra of pure components with a classical least squares (CLS) multivariate method applied to several ranges of the mid-infrared spectra. The only variable parameters of the analysis are the concentrations of each component themselves and the baseline shift of the spectrum during the reaction. The advantage of using multivariate analysis over the analysis of a single vibrational band, as well as the limitations of this type of spectral analysis, are discussed.

Molecule-enhanced surface-enhanced infrared absorption spectroscopy (MOSEIRA)

Surface-enhanced infrared absorption spectroscopy (SEIRA) of methanol, ethanol, 1-propanol, and 2-propanol in thin films on planar silver halide (AgX) fibers under slow N(2) flow using 1 sec scans reveals structure in absorbance-time plots. The absorption intensities show extra enhancements (3x) in the absorbance (O--H stretch) ascribed to oligomers present at the AgX surface (molecule enhanced, thus MOSEIRA). This is above those due to amplification (40x, 20 reflections) and enhancement (30x, image dipoles or surface phonon polaritons). In the case of ethanol an excellent initial pentamer spectrum evolves over 8-10 min to a mixture of pentamer, tetramer, and trimer spectra that within another minute forms small oligomers and monomers. We use a new type of cell for infrared spectroscopy containing an AgX planar fiber. The optical configuration leads to a vicinal region at the surface defined by evanescent waves. Within this region are surface-induced organized species such as ethanol oligomers. The planar AgX fiber supports 20 reflections and transmits light over a wide visible-infrared wavelength range. Short scan times permit the study of volatile substrates or solvents, including the effects of solvent polarity.

Distributions of H-Bonding Aggregates in tert-Butyl Alcohol: The Pure Liquid and Its Alkane Mixtures

A vibrational analysis using FTIR and Raman spectroscopies was carried out on pure liquid t-butyl alcohol (TBA) in the range of temperatures 15 < or = t < or = 70 degrees C. The whole range of molar fractions for TBA in 2,2'dimethylbutane (2,2'DMB) was also explored and compared with the t dependence of pure alcohol properties. Temperature and composition dependence of vibrational spectra were reproduced by simultaneous fitting of IR and Raman OH-stretching band contours by using harmonic frequencies and intensities derived from ab initio calculations for the various hydrogen-bonded structures. Adopting this fitting procedure, size and shape distributions of H-bonding aggregates have been derived, thus giving a quantitative description of balancing factors between hydrophilic and hydrophobic interactions in this liquid system.

Concentration fluctuations and collective properties in mixed liquid systems: Rayleigh-Brillouin spectra oftert-butyl alcohol/ 2,2′-dimethylbutane liquid mixture

Rayleigh-Brillouin spectra have been measured in a range of temperatures and compositions of t-butyl alcohol/2,2(')-dimethylbutane liquid mixture. The mixture mole fraction has been varied from pure alkane (x(TBA)=0) to pure alcohol (x(TBA)=1) at temperatures between 283 and 323 K. In the same composition and temperature ranges the authors also executed measurements of mass density, shear viscosity, and refractive index. From light scattering spectra the authors have extracted the hypersound velocities and adiabatic compressibilities and evaluated their excess values. Moreover, the authors attempted to evaluate the isothermal (40 degrees C) Landau-Placzek ratios at various mole fractions, but these values proved to be subject to significant errors due to great uncertainty in the central component intensity measurements. Thus, in discussing the results, this latter quantity was considered only from a qualitative point of view. These results highlight a nonideal behavior of the studied liquid mixture with a probable azeotropic composition around x(TBA)=0.7 due to formation of small clusters of hydrogen-bonded alcohol tetramers that are completely surrounded by solvent molecules and analogous or smaller clusters. These clusters, shaped as inverse micelles, offer their hydrophobic moiety towards the molecules that constitute the solvation shell, resulting in a low polarity solution structure that minimizes the solute-solvent interactions. Differences in thermal and compositional behavior of excess molar volumes and adiabatic compressibilities have been interpreted by attributing different weights to the solute-solvent interaction forces and to the hydrogen bond connectivity effects.

Hydrogen bonding in liquid and supercritical 1-octanol and 2-octanol assessed by near and midinfrared spectroscopy

The near and midinfrared spectra of 1-octanol (and 2-octanol) have been measured along the liquid-gas coexistence curve from room temperature up to the critical point and in the supercritical domain along the isotherm T=385 degrees C (and T=365 degrees C) above the critical point of both 1-octanol and 2-octanol for pressure ranging from 0.5 up to 15 MPa. The density values of SC 1- and 2-octanol have been estimated by analysing the near infrared (NIR) spectra in the 3nu(a)(CH) region. A quantitative analysis of the absorption band associated with the OH stretching vibration [nu(OH)] and its first and second overtones [2nu(OH) and 3nu(OH)] was carried out in order to estimate the percentage of "free" OH groups in both alcohols in the whole thermodynamic domain investigated here. Very consistent results have been obtained from the independent analysis of these three different absorption bands which gave us a good confidence in the degree of hydrogen bonding reported here for 1- and 2-octanol. Thus, the percentage of free OH groups which is around 5% in liquid 1-octanol under ambient conditions strongly increase up to 70%-80% at a temperature of about 340 degrees C. Then, in the supercritical domain, upon a decrease of the density from 0.4 to 0.1 g cm(-3), the fraction of free hydroxyl groups is nearly constant presenting a plateaulike regime around 80%. As the density decreases again, this plateau regime is followed by a further increase of X(nb) which reaches a value of 96% for the system in the gaseous phase (0.01 g cm(-3); P=0.45 MPa). Finally, it comes out from this study that the percentage of free OH groups is always greater in 2-octanol than in 1-octanol at the same density.

Pressure and Temperature Dependence of the Hydrogen Bonding in Supercritical Ethanol: A Computer Simulation Study

As a step toward deeper insight on the "hydrogen bonding" in supercritical ethanol (scEtOH), we carried out NVT molecular dynamics simulations of the fluid over a wide range of temperatures and pressures. The fluid was studied at SC conditions for which thermodynamic and spectroscopic (NMR, infrared, Raman, dielectric) data are available. The various site-site pair distribution functions (pdf's) were calculated, and their temperature and pressure dependence was obtained. It was found that over the thermodynamic conditions investigated here, scEtOH remains highly structured. Moreover, the characteristic behavior of the first peaks in H-H, O-O, and H-O pdf's reveals that hydrogen bonds still exist in scEtOH. The analysis focuses also on the reorientational dynamics of the bond unit vectors O-H, C-O, and of the permanent dipole moment of the molecules as well as the total dipole moment of the sample. The corresponding Legendre time correlation functions were discussed in connection to the "hydrogen bonding" in the fluid and in the context of experimental results. Specifically, the behavior of the O-H dynamics exhibits the well-known associative nature of the molecules in the system. A further analysis of the hydrogen bonds was carried out, and the degree of aggregation (average number of H-bonds per molecule) was obtained and compared with results from NMR chemical shift studies. Also the estimated monomer and free O-H groups in the fluid were compared with results from IR and Raman vibrational spectroscopy. The percentage analysis fi of the liquid and scEtOH molecules, with i = 0, 1, 2, 3, ... hydrogen bonds per molecule, has been obtained. The results show the existence of small, linear-chain oligomers formed mainly by two molecules, whereas the number of the three body oligomers, and specifically that of four body oligomers in the sample, is relatively small.