Useful lower limits to polarization contributions to intermolecular interactions using a minimal basis of localized orthogonal orbitals: theory and analysis of the water dimer.

The problem of describing the energy-lowering associated with polarization of interacting molecules is considered in the overlapping regime for self-consistent field wavefunctions. The existing approach of solving for absolutely localized molecular orbital (ALMO) coefficients that are block-diagonal in the fragments is shown based on formal grounds and practical calculations to often overestimate the strength of polarization effects. A new approach using a minimal basis of polarized orthogonal local MOs (polMOs) is developed as an alternative. The polMO basis is minimal in the sense that one polarization function is provided for each unpolarized orbital that is occupied; such an approach is exact in second-order perturbation theory. Based on formal grounds and practical calculations, the polMO approach is shown to underestimate the strength of polarization effects. In contrast to the ALMO method, however, the polMO approach yields results that are very stable to improvements in the underlying AO basis expansion. Combining the ALMO and polMO approaches allows an estimate of the range of energy-lowering due to polarization. Extensive numerical calculations on the water dimer using a large range of basis sets with Hartree-Fock theory and a variety of different density functionals illustrate the key considerations. Results are also presented for the polarization-dominated Na(+)CH4 complex. Implications for energy decomposition analysis of intermolecular interactions are discussed.

An energy decomposition analysis for intermolecular interactions from an absolutely localized molecular orbital reference at the coupled-cluster singles and doubles level.

We propose a wave function-based method for the decomposition of intermolecular interaction energies into chemically-intuitive components, isolating both mean-field- and explicit correlation-level contributions. We begin by solving the locally-projected self-consistent field for molecular interactions equations for a molecular complex, obtaining an intramolecularly polarized reference of self-consistently optimized, absolutely-localized molecular orbitals (ALMOs), determined with the constraint that each fragment MO be composed only of atomic basis functions belonging to its own fragment. As explicit inter-electronic correlation is integral to an accurate description of weak forces underlying intermolecular interaction potentials, namely, coordinated fluctuations in weakly interacting electronic densities, we add dynamical correlation to the ALMO polarized reference at the coupled-cluster singles and doubles level, accounting for explicit dispersion and charge-transfer effects, which map naturally onto the cluster operator. We demonstrate the stability of energy components with basis set extension, follow the hydrogen bond-breaking coordinate in the C(s)-symmetry water dimer, decompose the interaction energies of dispersion-bound rare gas dimers and other van der Waals complexes, and examine charge transfer-dominated donor-acceptor interactions in borane adducts. We compare our results with high-level calculations and experiment when possible.