Daryl L. Howard

SH-stretching vibrational spectra of ethanethiol and tert-butylthiol.

Vibrational spectra of vapor-phase ethanethiol and tert-butylthiol have been recorded in the 1000 to 12,000 cm(-1) region. Both the gauche and trans conformers of ethanethiol are observed. The intensities of SH-stretching vibrations are found to be significantly weaker than the equivalent CH-stretching vibrations and the OH-stretching vibrations in the corresponding alcohols. The relative strength of the SH-stretching vibrations in ethanethiol and tert-butylthiol compared with the OH-stretching vibrations in the corresponding alcohols are approximately 0.2 in the fundamental region and approximately 0.03 in the overtone regions. The SH- and OH-stretching intensities have been modeled with an anharmonic oscillator local mode model with ab initio calculated dipole moment functions. The weak nature of SH-stretching transitions is shown to be a result of both low anharmonicity of the vibrational mode and relatively small dipole moment derivatives.

Infrared and Near-Infrared Spectroscopy of Acetylacetone and Hexafluoroacetylacetone.

The infrared and near-infrared spectra of acetylacetone, acetylacetone-d8, and hexafluoroacetylacetone are characterized from experiment and computations at different levels. In the fundamental region, the intramolecular hydrogen bonded OH-stretching transition is clearly observed as a very broad band with substantial structure and located at significantly lower frequency compared to common OH-stretching frequencies. There is no clear evidence for OH-stretching overtone transitions in the near-infrared region, which is dominated by the CH-stretching overtones of the methine and methyl CH bonds. From molecular dynamics (MD) simulations, with a potential energy surface previously validated for tunneling splittings, the infrared spectra are determined and used in assigning the experimentally measured ones. It is found that the simulated spectrum in the region associated with the proton transfer mode is exquisitely sensitive to the height of the barrier for proton transfer. Comparison of the experimental and the MD simulated spectra establishes that the barrier height is around 2.5 kcal/mol, which favorably compares with 3.2 kcal/mol obtained from high-level electronic structure calculations.

Resonance coupling in the fourth OH-stretching overtone spectrum of formic acid.

The room-temperature vibrational overtone spectra of the formic acid isotopomers HCOOH and DCOOH have been recorded in the third and fourth OH-stretching overtone regions with intracavity laser photoacoustic spectroscopy. Resonance coupling between the OH- and CH-stretching vibrations in HCOOH is clearly identified in the fourth overtone region. This is an example of strong coupling across bonds. In the third overtone region, no resonance is observed. Vibrational energies and intensities of the OH- and CH-stretching overtones and combination bands have been calculated with an anharmonic oscillator local mode model. The pure OH-stretching bright state carries almost all the intensity prior to resonance coupling.

The effect of NH2-inversion tunneling splitting on the NH-stretching overtone spectra of aniline vapour

The room temperature vibrational overtone spectrum of aniline vapour has been recorded by intracavity laser photoacoustic spectroscopy in the 9700 cm−1 to 16u2006600 cm−1 region. The NH-stretching overtone bands exhibit spectral structure due to the tunneling splitting of the amino group inversion states. We find that this tunneling splitting steadily decreases with increasing NH-stretching vibrational excitation, and at the fourth NH-stretching overtone the splitting is negligible. Wave numbers and intensities of the NH- and CH-stretching vibrational overtones were calculated with a harmonically coupled anharmonic oscillator local mode model to facilitate spectral assignment. The conventional liquid phase overtone spectra of aniline were recorded and the measured absolute intensities are in good agreement with the calculated intensities.

Overtone Spectra of 2-Mercaptoethanol and 1,2-Ethanedithiol

Vibrational spectra of vapor-phase 1,2-ethanedithiol and 2-mercaptoethanol were recorded to investigate weak intramolecular interactions. The spectra were recorded with conventional absorption spectroscopy and laser photoacoustic spectroscopy in the 2000-11,000 cm(-1) region. The room temperature spectra of each molecule are complicated by contributions from several conformers. Anharmonic oscillator local-mode calculations of the OH- and SH-stretching transitions have been performed to facilitate assignment of the different conformers in the spectra. We observe evidence of hydrogen-bond-like interactions from OH to S, but not from SH to O or S. The OH to S intramolecular interaction in 2-mercaptoethanol is weak and comparable to that found in the OH to O interaction in ethylene glycol.