Morgane Vacher

Coupled electron-nuclear dynamics: charge migration and charge transfer initiated near a conical intersection.

Coupled electron-nuclear dynamics, implemented using the Ehrenfest method, has been used to study charge migration with fixed nuclei, together with charge transfer when nuclei are allowed to move. Simulations were initiated at reference geometries of neutral benzene and 2-phenylethylamine (PEA), and at geometries close to potential energy surface crossings in the cations. Cationic eigenstates, and the so-called sudden approximation, involving removal of an electron from a correlated ground-state wavefunction for the neutral species, were used as initial conditions. Charge migration without coupled nuclear motion could be observed if the Ehrenfest simulation, using the sudden approximation, was started near a conical intersection where the states were both strongly coupled and quasi-degenerate. Further, the main features associated with charge migration were still recognizable when the nuclear motion was allowed to couple. In the benzene radical cation, starting from the reference neutral geometry with the sudden approximation, one could observe sub-femtosecond charge migration with a small amplitude, which results from weak interaction with higher electronic states. However, we were able to engineer large amplitude charge migration, with a period between 10 and 100 fs, corresponding to oscillation of the electronic structure between the quinoid and anti-quinoid cationic electronic configurations, by distorting the geometry along the derivative coupling vector from the D6h Jahn-Teller crossing to lower symmetry where the states are not degenerate. When the nuclear motion becomes coupled, the period changes only slightly. In PEA, in an Ehrenfest trajectory starting from the D2 eigenstate and reference geometry, a partial charge transfer occurs after about 12 fs near the first crossing between D1, D2 (N(+)-Phenyl, N-Phenyl(+)). If the Ehrenfest propagation is started near this point, using the sudden approximation without coupled nuclear motion, one observes an oscillation of the spin density--charge migration--between the N atom and the phenyl ring with a period of 4 fs. When the nuclear motion becomes coupled, this oscillation persists in a damped form, followed by an effective charge transfer after 30 fs.

Electron Dynamics upon Ionization of Polyatomic Molecules : Coupling to Quantum Nuclear Motion and Decoherence

Knowledge about the electronic motion in molecules is essential for our understanding of chemical reactions and biological processes. The advent of attosecond techniques opens up the possibility to induce electronic motion, observe it in real time, and potentially steer it. A fundamental question remains the factors influencing electronic decoherence and the role played by nuclear motion in this process. Here, we simulate the dynamics upon ionization of the polyatomic molecules paraxylene and modified bismethylene-adamantane, with a quantum mechanical treatment of both electron and nuclear dynamics using the direct dynamics variational multiconfigurational Gaussian method. Our simulations give new important physical insights about the expected decoherence process. We have shown that the decoherence of electron dynamics happens on the time scale of a few femtoseconds, with the interplay of different mechanisms: the dephasing is responsible for the fast decoherence while the nuclear overlap decay may actually help maintain it and is responsible for small revivals.

The second-order Ehrenfest method

Abstract This article describes the Ehrenfest method and our second-order implementation (with approximate gradient and Hessian) within a CASSCF formalism. We demonstrate that the second-order implementation with the predictor–corrector integration method improves the accuracy of the simulation significantly in terms of energy conservation. Although the method is general and can be used to study any coupled electron–nuclear dynamics, we apply it to investigate charge migration upon ionization of small organic molecules, focusing on benzene cation. Using this approach, we can study the evolution of a non-stationary electronic wavefunction for fixed atomic nuclei, and where the nuclei are allowed to move, to investigate the interplay between them for the first time. Analysis methods for the interpretation of the electronic and nuclear dynamics are suggested: we monitor the electronic dynamics by calculating the spin density of the system as a function of time.

Communication: Oscillating charge migration between lone pairs persists without significant interaction with nuclear motion in the glycine and Gly-Gly-NH-CH3 radical cations

Coupled electron-nuclear dynamics has been studied, using the Ehrenfest method, for four conformations of the glycine molecule and a single conformation of Gly-Gly-NH-CH3. The initial electronic wavepacket was a superposition of eigenstates corresponding to ionization from the σ lone pairs associated with the carbonyl oxygens and the amine nitrogen. For glycine, oscillating charge migration (when the nuclei were frozen) was observed for the 4 conformers studied with periods ranging from 2 to 5 fs, depending on the energy gap between the lone pair cationic states. When coupled nuclear motion was allowed (which was mainly NH2 partial inversion), the oscillations hardly changed. For Gly-Gly-NH-CH3, charge migration between the carbonyl oxygens and the NH2 lone pair can be observed with a period similar to glycine itself, also without interaction with nuclear motion. These simulations suggest that charge migration between lone pairs can occur independently of the nuclear motion.

Electron dynamics upon ionization: control of the timescale through chemical substitution and effect of nuclear motion.

Photoionization can generate a non-stationary electronic state, which leads to coupled electron-nuclear dynamics in molecules. In this article, we choose benzene cation as a prototype because vertical ionization of the neutral species leads to a Jahn-Teller degeneracy between ground and first excited states of the cation. Starting with equal populations of ground and first excited states, there is no electron dynamics in this case. However, if we add methyl substituents that break symmetry but do not radically alter the electronic structure, we see charge migration: oscillations in the spin density that we can correlate with particular localized electronic structures, with a period depending on the gap between the states initially populated. We have also investigated the effect of nuclear motion on electron dynamics using a complete active space self-consistent field (CASSCF) implementation of the Ehrenfest method, most previous theoretical studies of electron dynamics having been carried out with fixed nuclei. In toluene cation for instance, simulations where the nuclei are allowed to move show significant differences in the electron dynamics after 3 fs, compared to simulations with fixed nuclei.

Electronic control of initial nuclear dynamics adjacent to a conical intersection.

Photoionization can create a nonstationary electronic state and therefore initiates coupled electron-nuclear dynamics in molecules. Using a CASSCF implementation of the Ehrenfest method, we study the nuclear dynamics following vertical ionization of toluene, starting close to the conical intersection between ground and first excited states of its cation. The results show how the initial nuclear dynamics is controlled by the nonstationary electronic state character. In particular, ionization of this system leading to an equal superposition of the two lowest energy states can initiate nuclear dynamics in an orthogonal direction in the branching space to dynamics on the ground or first excited state potential energy surfaces alone.

Direct methods for non-adiabatic dynamics: connecting the single-set variational multi-configuration Gaussian (vMCG) and Ehrenfest perspectives

Abstract In this article, we outline the current state-of-the-art “on-the-fly” methods for non-adiabatic dynamics, highlighting the similarities and differences between them. We derive the equations of motion for both the Ehrenfest and variational multi-configuration Gaussian (vMCG) methods from the Dirac–Frenkel variational principle. We explore the connections between these two methods by presenting an alternative derivation of the vMCG method, which gives the Ehrenfest equations of motion when taking the appropriate limits.

Nuclear spatial delocalization silences electron density oscillations in 2-phenyl-ethyl-amine (PEA) and 2-phenylethyl-N,N-dimethylamine (PENNA) cations

We simulate electron dynamics following ionization in 2-phenyl-ethyl-amine and 2-phenylethyl-N,N-dimethylamine as examples of systems where 3 coupled cationic states are involved. We study two nuclear effects on electron dynamics: (i) coupled electron-nuclear motion and (ii) nuclear spatial delocalization as a result of the zero-point energy in the neutral molecule. Within the Ehrenfest approximation, our calculations show that the coherent electron dynamics in these molecules is not lost as a result of coupled electron-nuclear motion. In contrast, as a result of nuclear spatial delocalization, dephasing of the oscillations occurs on a time scale of only a few fs, long before any significant nuclear motion can occur. The results have been rationalized using a semi-quantitative model based upon the gradients of the potential energy surfaces.

Auger electron and photoabsorption spectra of glycine in the vicinity of the oxygen K-edge measured with an X-FEL

We report the first measurement of the near oxygen K-edge auger spectrum of the glycine molecule. Our work employed an x-ray free electron laser as the photon source operated with input photon energies tunable between 527 and 547 eV. Complete electron spectra were recorded at each photon energy in the tuning range, revealing resonant and non-resonant auger structures. Finally ab initio theoretical predictions are compared with the measured above the edge auger spectrum and an assignment of auger decay channels is performed.

Chemi- and Bioluminescence of Cyclic Peroxides

Bioluminescence is a phenomenon that has fascinated mankind for centuries. Today the phenomenon and its sibling, chemiluminescence, have impacted society with a number of useful applications in fields like analytical chemistry and medicine, just to mention two. In this review, a molecular-orbital perspective is adopted to explain the chemistry behind chemiexcitation in both chemi- and bioluminescence. First, the uncatalyzed thermal dissociation of 1,2-dioxetane is presented and analyzed to explain, for example, the preference for triplet excited product states and increased yield with larger nonreactive substituents. The catalyzed fragmentation reaction and related details are then exemplified with substituted 1,2-dioxetanone species. In particular, the preference for singlet excited product states in that case is explained. The review also examines the diversity of specific solutions both in Nature and in artificial systems and the difficulties in identifying the emitting species and unraveling the color modulation process. The related subject of excited-state chemistry without light absorption is finally discussed. The content of this review should be an inspiration to human design of new molecular systems expressing unique light-emitting properties. An appendix describing the state-of-the-art experimental and theoretical methods used to study the phenomena serves as a complement.