Probing Chemical Reactions: Evidence for Exploration of an Excited Potential Energy Surface at Thermal Energies

Arbitrary order El'yashevich-Wilson B tensor formulas for the most frequently used internal coordinates in molecular vibrational analyses

In recent years, internal coordinates have become the preferred means of expressing potential energy surfaces. The ability to transform quantities from chemically significant internal coordinates to primitive Cartesian coordinates and spectroscopically relevant normal coordinates is thus critical to the further development of computational chemistry. In the present work, general nth order formulas are presented for the Cartesian derivatives of the five most commonly used internal coordinates--bond stretching, bond angle, torsion, out-of-plane angle, and linear bending. To compose such formulas in a reasonably understandable fashion, a new notation is developed that is a generalization of that which has been used previously for similar purposes. The notation developed leads to easily programmable and reasonably understandable arbitrary order formulas, yet it is powerful enough to express the arbitrary order B tensor of a general, N-point internal coordinate, as is done herein. The techniques employed in the derivation of such formulas are relatively straightforward, and could presumably be applied to a number of other internal coordinates as needed.