The field of organic chemistry has developed dramatically during the past forty years. This collection includes many of the important areas of current research interest. It is devoted to one of the subfields of theoretical and computational chemistry which continues to provide "grand challenges" as well as unprecedented opportunities - the electronic structure of molecules.
The present volume is concerned with two of the central questions of chemical dynamics. What do we know about the energies of interaction of atoms and molecules with each other and with solid surfaces? How can such interaction energies be used to understand and make quantitative predictions about dynamical processes like scattering, energy transfer, and chemical reactions? It is becoming clearly recognized that the computer is leading to rapid progress in answering these questions. The computer allows probing dynamical mechanisms in fine detail and often allows us to answer questions that cannot be addressed with current experimental techniques. As we enter the 1980's, not only are more powerful and faster computers being used, but techniques and methods have been honed to a state where exciting and reliable data are being generated on a variety of systems at an unprecedented pace. The present volume presents a collection of work that illustrates the capabilities and some of the successes of this kind of computer-assisted research. In a 1978 Chemical Society Report, Frey and Walsh pointed out that "it is extremely doubtful if a calculated energy of activation for any unimolecular decomposition can replace an experimental deter mination. " However they also recorded that they "believe[d] that some of the elaborate calculations being performed at present do suggest that we may be approaching a time when a choice between reaction mechanisms will be helped by such [computational] work.
The development and computational implementation of analytical expres sions for the low-order derivatives of electronic energy surfaces and other molecular properties has undergone rapid growth in recent years. It is now fairly routine for chemists to make use of energy gradient information in locating and identifying stable geometries and transition states. The use of second analytical derivative (Hessian or curvature) expressions is not yet routine, and third and higher energy derivatives as well as property (e.g., dipole moment, polarizability) derivatives are just beginning to be applied to chemical problems. This NATO Advanced Research Workshop focused on analyzing the re lative merits of various strategies for deriving the requisite analyti cal expressions, for computing necessary integral derivatives and wave function parameter derivatives, and for efficiently coding these expres sions on conventional scalar machines and vector-oriented computers. The participant list contained many scientists who have been instrumen tal in bringing this field to fruition as well as eminent scientists who have broad knowledge and experience in quantum chemistry in general.
Potential Energy Surfaces is a collection of lectures given at the 1996 Mariapfarr Workshop in Theoretical Chemistry, organized by Alexander F. Sax. The Mariapfarr Workshops' aim is to discuss in-depth topics in Theoretical Chemistry. The target group of these workshops is graduate students and postdocs.
These two volumes deal with the quantum theory of the electronic structure of molecules. Implicit in the term ab initio is the notion that approximate solutions of Schrödinger's equation are sought "from the beginning," i. e. , without recourse to experimental data. From a more pragmatic viewpoint, the distin guishing feature of ab initio theory is usually the fact that no approximations are involved in the evaluation of the required molecular integrals. Consistent with current activity in the field, the first of these two volumes contains chapters dealing with methods per se, while the second concerns the application of these methods to problems of chemical interest. In asense, the motivation for these volumes has been the spectacular recent success of ab initio theory in resolving important chemical questions. However, these applications have only become possible through the less visible but equally important efforts of those develop ing new theoretical and computational methods and models. Henry F Schaefer Vll Contents Contents of Volume 4 XIX Chapter 1. Gaussian Basis Sets for Molecular Calculations Thom. H. Dunning, Ir. and P. Ieffrey Hay 1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 1. 1. Slater Functions and the Hydrogen Moleeule 1 1. 2. Gaussian Functions and the Hydrogen Atom 3 2. Hartree-Fock Calculations on the First Row Atoms 5 2. 1. Valence States of the First Row Atoms 6 7 2. 2. Rydberg States of the First Row Atoms 9 2. 3.
The Reviews in Computational Chemistry series brings together leading authorities in the field to teach the newcomer and update the expert on topics centered on molecular modeling, such as computer-assisted molecular design (CAMD), quantum chemistry, molecular mechanics and dynamics, and quantitative structure-activity relationships (QSAR). This volume, like those prior to it, features chapters by experts in various fields of computational chemistry. Topics in Volume 31 include: Lattice-Boltzmann Modeling of Multicomponent Systems: An Introduction Modeling Mechanochemistry from First Principles Mapping Energy Transport Networks in Proteins The Role of Computations in Catalysis The Construction of Ab Initio Based Potential Energy Surfaces Uncertainty Quantification for Molecular Dynamics
Shows the diversity and sophistication of present knowledge of molecular collisions and the forces that govern their outcome, examining major aspects from the point of view of the potential surface. Covers such topics as angle dependent potentials, vibranic coupling, and branching ratios in simple atomic reactions.
The need for accurate computational procedures to evaluate detailed properties of gas phase chemical reactions is evident when one considers the wealth of information provided by laser, molecular beam and fast How experiments. By stressing ordinary scalar computers to their limiting performance quantum chemistry codes can already provide sufficiently accurate estimates of the stability of several small molecules and of the reactivity of a few elementary processes. However, the accurate characterization of a reactive process, even for small systems, is so demanding in terms of computer resources to make the use of supercomputers having vector and parallel features unavoidable. Sometimes to take full advantage from these features all is needed is a restructure of those parts of the computer code which perform vector and matrix manipulations and a parallel execution of its independent tasks. More often, a deeper restructure has to be carried out. This may involve the problem of choosing a suitable computational strategy or the more radical alternative of changing the theoretical treatment. There are cases, in fact, where theoretical approaches found to be inefficient on a scalar computer exhibit their full computational strength on a supercomputer.
This volume in the series brings together reknowned experts in the field to present the reader with an account of the latest developments in quantum mechanics, molecular dynamics, and the teaching of computational chemistry. There are so many developments in the field of computational chemistry that it is difficult to keep track of them. The series was established to review the high volume of developments in the field. Rather than create a traditional article, each author approaches a topic to enable the reader to understand and solve problems and locate key references quickly. Each article has tutorial value. An updated compendium of software for molecular modeling appears as an appendix as in previous volumes. To the editors' knowledge, this is the most complete listing of sources of software for computational chemistry anywhere.
