Tetsuya Taketsugu

Spectroscopic tracking of structural evolution in ultrafast stilbene photoisomerization.

Understanding a chemical reaction ultimately requires the knowledge of how each atom in the reactants moves during product formation. Such knowledge is seldom complete and is often limited to an oversimplified reaction coordinate that neglects global motions across the molecular framework. To overcome this limit, we recorded transient impulsive Raman spectra during ultrafast photoisomerization of cis-stilbene in solution. The results demonstrate a gradual frequency shift of a low-frequency spectator vibration, reflecting changes in the restoring force along this coordinate throughout the isomerization. A high-level quantum-chemical calculation reproduces this feature and associates it with a continuous structural change leading to the twisted configuration. This combined spectroscopic and computational approach should be amenable to detailed reaction visualization in other photoisomerizing systems as well.

Ab initio vibrational state calculations with a quartic force field: applications to H2CO, C2H4, CH3OH, CH3CCH, and C6H6.

For polyatomic molecules, n-mode coupling representations of the quartic force field (nMR-QFF) are presented, which include terms up to n normal coordinate couplings in a fourth-order polynomial potential energy function. The computational scheme to evaluate third-and fourth-order derivatives by finite differentiations of the energy is fully described. The code to generate the nMR-QFF has been implemented into GAMESS program package and interfaced with the vibrational self-consistent field (VSCF) and correlation corrected VSCF (cc-VSCF) methods. As a demonstration, fundamental frequencies have been calculated by the cc-VSCF method based on 2MR-QFF for formaldehyde, ethylene, methanol, propyne, and benzene. The applications show that 2MR-QFF is a highly accurate potential energy function, with errors of 1.0-1.9% relative to the experimental value in fundamental frequencies. This approach will help quantitative evaluations of vibrational energies of a general molecule with a reasonable computational cost.

Direct Vibrational Self-Consistent Field Method: Applications to H2O and H2CO

The vibrational self-consistent field (VSCF) and virtual configuration interaction (VCI) methods are directly combined with ab initio electronic structure calculations for evaluations of the potential energy at VSCF quadrature points. Referred to as direct VSCF and direct VCI, respectively, these methods have been applied to evaluations of anharmonic vibrational energy levels of H2O and H2CO at the second-order Mo/ller–Plesset MP2/aug-cc-pVTZ and MP2/cc-pVTZ computational levels, respectively. The purpose of the present study is to develop a direct methodology for vibrational state calculations by examining the accuracy of the results, as well as their computational costs. In addition, the accuracy and applicability of two approximate potential energy surfaces (PES), a quartic force field (QFF), and the PES determined by the modified-Shepard interpolation method (Int-PES), are investigated via comparisons of calculated energy levels of vibrational states with those derived by the direct methods. The resul...

Boron Nitride Nanosheet on Gold as an Electrocatalyst for Oxygen Reduction Reaction: Theoretical Suggestion and Experimental Proof

Boron nitride (BN), which is an insulator with a wide band gap, supported on Au is theoretically suggested and experimentally proved to act as an electrocatalyst for oxygen reduction reaction (ORR). Density-functional theory calculations show that the band gap of a free h-BN monolayer is 4.6 eV but a slight protrusion of the unoccupied BN states toward the Fermi level is observed if BN is supported on Au(111) due to the BN-Au interaction. A theoretically predicted metastable configuration of O2 on h-BN/Au(111), which can serve as precursors for ORR, and free energy diagrams for ORR on h-BN/Au(111) via two- and four-electron pathways show that ORR to H2O2 is possible at this electrode. It is experimentally proved that overpotential for ORR at the gold electrode is significantly reduced by depositing BN nanosheets. No such effect is observed at the glassy carbon electrode, demonstrating the importance of BN-substrate interaction for h-BN to act as the ORR electrocatalyst. A possible role of the edge of the BN islands for ORR is also discussed.

Generation of full-dimensional potential energy surface of intramolecular hydrogen atom transfer in malonaldehyde and tunneling dynamics

The potential energy surface (PES) for the malonaldehyde intramolecular hydrogen atom transfer has been generated with full dimensionality by the modified Shepard interpolation method at the computational level of the second-order Moller–Plesset perturbation theory. The reference points have been set along the reaction path of H atom transfer (51 points), in a three-dimensional reaction space determined by geometrical features of the reaction path (219 points), and in the region of cis- and trans-enol isomerization reaction paths (428 points), so the resultant PES was generated in terms of ab initio data (energies, gradients, and Hessian matrices) of 698 reference points. Following trajectory simulations on the full-dimensional PES, the energy splitting of vibrational ground states due to tunneling was estimated by the semiclassical method of Makri and Miller [J. Chem. Phys. 91, 4026 (1989)]. The tunneling splitting was evaluated as 13.9 cm−1, which is in good agreement with the experimental value of 21.6...

Tunneling splitting in polyatomic molecules: Application to malonaldehyde

We report an accurate and efficient full dimensional semiclassical ab initio method for calculation of energy level splitting due to tunneling in polyatomic system. The method is applied to 21-dimensional 9-atomic malonaldehyde molecule. The tunneling splittings obtained are ΔE(H)=21.2 cm−1 for hydrogen atom transfer and ΔE(D)=3.0 cm−1 for deuterium atom transfer, which are in excellent agreement with the experimental values of 21.6 cm−1 and, 2.9 cm−1 respectively. We believe that the present analysis gives the final solution to the longstanding problem.

Ab initio molecular dynamics simulation of photoisomerization in azobenzene in the nπ∗ state

Photoisomerization mechanism of azobenzene in the lowest excited state S(1)(n pi(*)) is investigated by ab initio molecular dynamics (AIMD) simulation with the RATTLE algorithm, based on the state-averaged complete active space self-consistent field method. AIMD simulations show that cis to trans isomerization occurs via two-step rotation mechanism, accompanying rotations of the central NN part and two phenyl rings, and this process can be classified into two types, namely, clockwise and counterclockwise rotation pathways. On the other hand, trans to cis isomerization occurs via conventional rotation pathway where two phenyl rings rotate around the NN bond. The quantum yields are calculated to be 0.45 and 0.28+/-0.14 for cis to trans and trans to cis photoisomerizations, respectively, which are in very good agreement with the corresponding experimental results.

Exploring transition state structures for intramolecular pathways by the artificial force induced reaction method

Finding all required transition state (TS) structures is an important but hard task in theoretical study of complex reaction mechanisms. In the present article, an efficient automated TS search method, artificial force induced reaction (AFIR), was extended to intramolecular reactions. The AFIR method has been developed for intermolecular associative pathways between two or more reactants. Although it has also been applied to intramolecular reactions by dividing molecules manually into fragments, the fragmentation scheme was not automated. In this work, we propose an automated fragmentation scheme. Using this fragmentation scheme and the AFIR method, a fully automated search algorithm for intramolecular pathways is introduced. This version for intramolecular reactions is called single‐component AFIR (SC‐AFIR), to distinguish it from multicomponent AFIR for intermolecular reactions. SC‐AFIR was tested with two reactions, the Claisen rearrangement and the first step of cobalt‐catalyzed hydroformylation, and successfully located all important pathways reported in the literature.

Ab Initio QM/MM Molecular Dynamics Study on the Excited-State Hydrogen Transfer of 7-Azaindole in Water Solution

Ab initio molecular dynamics (AIMD) simulations for the excited-state hydrogen transfer (ESHT) reaction of 7-azaindole (7AI-(H2O)n; n = 1, 2) clusters in the gas phase and in water are presented. The effective fragment potential (EFP) is employed to model the surrounding water molecules. The AIMD simulations for 7AI-H2O and 7AI-(H2O)2 clusters show an asynchronous hydrogen transfer at t approximately 50 fs after the photoexcitation. While the ESHT mechanism for 7AI-H2O in water does not change appreciably compared with that in the gas phase, the AIMD simulations on 7AI-(H2O)2 in water solution exhibit two different mechanisms. Since the tautomer form is lower in energy compared to the normal form in the S1 state, 7AI and (H2O) n fragments separate from each other after the ESHT. With the use of the results of the AIMD trajectories, the minimum energy conical intersection point in the tautomer region has also been located.

Theoretical predictions for hexagonal BN based nanomaterials as electrocatalysts for the oxygen reduction reaction

The catalytic activity for the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) of both the pristine and defect-possessing hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN) monolayer and H-terminated nanoribbon have been studied theoretically using density functional theory. It is demonstrated that an inert h-BN monolayer can be functionalized and become catalytically active by nitrogen doping. It is shown that the energetics of adsorption of O(2), O, OH, OOH, and H(2)O on N atom impurities in the h-BN monolayer (N(B)@h-BN) is quite similar to that known for a Pt(111) surface. The specific mechanism of destructive and cooperative adsorption of ORR intermediates on the surface point defects is discussed. It is demonstrated that accounting for entropy and zero-point energy (ZPE) corrections results in destabilization of the ORR intermediates adsorbed on N(B)@h-BN, while solvent effects lead to their stabilization. Therefore, entropy, ZPE and solvent effects partly cancel each other and have to be taken into account simultaneously. Analysis of the free energy changes along the ORR pathway allows us to suggest that a N-doped h-BN monolayer can demonstrate catalytic properties for the ORR under the condition that electron transport to the catalytically active center is provided.