Gerrit C. Groenenboom

Predictions of the Properties of Water from First Principles

A force field for water has been developed entirely from first principles, without any fitting to experimental data. It contains both pairwise and many-body interactions. This force field predicts the properties of the water dimer and of liquid water in excellent agreement with experiments, a previously elusive objective. Precise knowledge of the intermolecular interactions in water will facilitate a better understanding of this ubiquitous substance.

Near-threshold inelastic collisions using molecular beams with a tunable velocity

Molecular scattering behavior has generally proven difficult to study at low collision energies. We formed a molecular beam of OH radicals with a narrow velocity distribution and a tunable absolute velocity by passing the beam through a Stark decelerator. The transition probabilities for inelastic scattering of the OH radicals with Xe atoms were measured as a function of the collision energy in the range of 50 to 400 wavenumbers, with an overall energy resolution of about 13 wavenumbers. The behavior of the cross-sections for inelastic scattering near the energetic thresholds was accurately measured, and excellent agreement was obtained with cross-sections derived from coupled-channel calculations on ab initio computed potential energy surfaces.

Water pair potential of near spectroscopic accuracy. I. Analysis of potential surface and virial coefficients

A new ab initio pair potential for water was generated by fitting 2510 interaction energies computed by the use of symmetry-adapted perturbation theory (SAPT). The new site–site functional form, named SAPT-5s, is simple enough to be applied in molecular simulations of condensed phases and at the same time reproduces the computed points with accuracy exceeding that of the elaborate SAPT-pp functional form used earlier [J. Chem. Phys. 107, 4207 (1997)]. SAPT-5s has been shown to quantitatively predict the water dimer spectra, see the following paper (paper II). It also gives the second virial coefficient in excellent agreement with experiment. Features of the water dimer potential energy surface have been analyzed using SAPT-5s. Average values of powers of the intermolecular separation—obtained from the ground-state rovibrational wave function computed in the SAPT-5s potential—have been combined with measured values to obtain a new empirical estimate of the equilibrium O–O separation equal to 5.50±0.01 bohr...

Water pair potential of near spectroscopic accuracy. II. Vibration–rotation–tunneling levels of the water dimer

Nearly exact six-dimensional quantum calculations of the vibration‐rotation‐tunneling ~VRT! levels of the water dimer for values of the rotational quantum numbers J and K <2 show that the SAPT-5s water pair potential presented in the preceding paper ~paper I! gives a good representation of the experimental high-resolution far-infrared spectrum of the water dimer. After analyzing the sensitivity of the transition frequencies with respect to the linear parameters in the potential we could further improve this potential by using only one of the experimentally determined tunneling splittings of the ground state in (H 2O) 2. The accuracy of the resulting water pair potential, SAPT-5st, is established by comparison with the spectroscopic data of both (H2O) 2 and (D2O) 2: ground and excited state tunneling splittings and rotational constants, as well as the frequencies of the intermolecular vibrations.

Polarizable interaction potential for water from coupled cluster calculations. II. Applications to dimer spectra, virial coefficients, and simulations of liquid water

The six-dimensional CC-pol interaction potential for the water dimer was used to predict properties of the dimer and of liquid water, in the latter case after being supplemented by a nonadditive potential. All the results were obtained purely from first principles, i.e., without any fitting to experimental data. Calculations of the vibration-rotation-tunneling levels of (H(2)O)(2) and (D(2)O)(2), a very sensitive test of the potential surface, gave results in good agreement with experimental high-resolution spectra. Also the virial coefficients and properties of liquid water agree well with measured values. The present model performs better than published force fields for water in a simultaneous reproduction of experimental data for dimer spectra, virials, and properties of the liquid.

New ab initio potential energy surface and the vibration-rotation-tunneling levels of (H2O)2 and (D2O)2

We report a new full-dimensional potential energy surface (PES) for the water dimer, based on fitting energies at roughly 30,000 configurations obtained with the coupled-cluster single and double, and perturbative treatment of triple excitations method using an augmented, correlation consistent, polarized triple zeta basis set. A global dipole moment surface based on Moller-Plesset perturbation theory results at these configurations is also reported. The PES is used in rigorous quantum calculations of intermolecular vibrational frequencies, tunneling splittings, and rotational constants for (H2O)2 and (D2O)2, using the rigid monomer approximation. Agreement with experiment is excellent and is at the highest level reported to date. The validity of this approximation is examined by comparing tunneling barriers within that model with those from fully relaxed calculations.

Quantum-state resolved bimolecular collisions of velocity-controlled oh with no radicals

When Molecules Collide As advances in computing power and algorithm design parallel the increasing sophistication of experimental apparatus, theory and measurement are perpetually trading places as to which can detail the dynamics of molecular interactions more precisely. At present, collisions of an atom with a diatomic molecule can be studied comparably in both domains. In contrast, collisions of two diatomics each bearing an unpaired electron manifest too many degrees of freedom for computational quantum mechanics. Kirste et al. (p. 1060) have now experimentally resolved the rotational dynamics of one such case—the inelastic scattering of NO + OH—and find that a simplified theoretical model focusing on long range interactions predicts the outcome surprisingly well. Such approximations could render many analogous systems moderately predictable. Precise experiments on bimolecular collisions show that simplifications rendering theory tractable confer reasonable accuracy. Whereas atom-molecule collisions have been studied with complete quantum-state resolution, interactions between two state-selected molecules have proven much harder to probe. Here, we report the measurement of state-resolved inelastic scattering cross sections for collisions between two open-shell molecules that are both prepared in a single quantum state. Stark-decelerated hydroxyl (OH) radicals were scattered with hexapole-focused nitric oxide (NO) radicals in a crossed-beam configuration. Rotationally and spin-orbit inelastic scattering cross sections were measured on an absolute scale for collision energies between 70 and 300 cm−1. These cross sections show fair agreement with quantum coupled-channels calculations using a set of coupled model potential energy surfaces based on ab initio calculations for the long-range nonadiabatic interactions and a simplistic short-range interaction. This comparison reveals the crucial role of electrostatic forces in complex molecular collision processes.

Polarizable interaction potential for water from coupled cluster calculations. I. Analysis of dimer potential energy surface

A six-dimensional interaction potential for the water dimer has been fitted to ab initio interaction energies computed at 2510 dimer configurations. These energies were obtained by combining the supermolecular second-order energies extrapolated to the complete basis set limit from up to quadruple-zeta quality basis sets with the contribution from the coupled-cluster method including single, double, and noniterative triple excitations computed in a triple-zeta quality basis set. All basis sets were augmented by diffuse functions and supplemented by midbond functions. The energies have been fitted using an analytic form with the induction component represented by a polarizable term, making the potential directly transferable to clusters and the bulk phase. Geometries and energies of stationary points on the potential surface agree well with the results of high-level ab initio geometry optimizations.

The radiative lifetime of metastable CO (a (3)Pi, v=0)

We present a combined experimental and theoretical study on the radiative lifetime of CO in the a (3)Pi(1,2), v=0 state. CO molecules in a beam are prepared in selected rotational levels of this metastable state, Stark-decelerated, and electrostatically trapped. From the phosphorescence decay in the trap, the radiative lifetime is measured to be 2.63+/-0.03 ms for the a (3)Pi(1), v=0, J=1 level. From the spin-orbit coupling between the a (3)Pi and the A (1)Pi states a 20% longer radiative lifetime of 3.16 ms is calculated for this level. It is concluded that coupling to other (1)Pi states contributes to the observed phosphorescence rate of metastable CO.

Direct Measurement of the Radiative Lifetime of Vibrationally Excited OH Radicals

Neutral molecules, isolated in the gas phase, can be prepared in a long-lived excited state and stored in a trap. The long observation time afforded by the trap can then be exploited to measure the radiative lifetime of this state by monitoring the temporal decay of the population in the trap. This method is demonstrated here and used to benchmark the Einstein A coefficients in the Meinel system of OH. A pulsed beam of vibrationally excited OH radicals is Stark decelerated and loaded into an electrostatic quadrupole trap. The radiative lifetime of the upper Lamda-doublet component of the Chi2Pi3/2, v=1, J=3/2 level is determined as 59.0+/-2.0 ms, in good agreement with the calculated value of 58.0+/-1.0 ms.