Experimental-computational study of shear interactions within double-walled carbon nanotube bundles.

The mechanical behavior of carbon nanotube (CNT)-based fibers and nanocomposites depends intimately on the shear interactions between adjacent tubes. We have applied an experimental-computational approach to investigate the shear interactions between adjacent CNTs within individual double-walled nanotube (DWNT) bundles. The force required to pull out an inner bundle of DWNTs from an outer shell of DWNTs was measured using in situ scanning electron microscopy methods. The normalized force per CNT-CNT interaction (1.7 ± 1.0 nN) was found to be considerably higher than molecular mechanics (MM)-based predictions for bare CNTs (0.3 nN). This MM result is similar to the force that results from exposure of newly formed CNT surfaces, indicating that the observed pullout force arises from factors beyond what arise from potential energy effects associated with bare CNTs. Through further theoretical considerations we show that the experimentally measured pullout force may include small contributions from carbonyl functional groups terminating the free ends of the CNTs, corrugation of the CNT-CNT interactions, and polygonization of the nanotubes due to their mutual interactions. In addition, surface functional groups, such as hydroxyl groups, that may exist between the nanotubes are found to play an unimportant role. All of these potential energy effects account for less than half of the ~1.7 nN force. However, partially pulled-out inner bundles are found not to pull back into the outer shell after the outer shell is broken, suggesting that dissipation is responsible for more than half of the pullout force. The sum of force contributions from potential energy and dissipation effects are found to agree with the experimental pullout force within the experimental error.

Dynamic QM/MM: a hybrid approach to simulating gas-liquid interactions.

In this chapter we describe molecular dynamics simulation methods in which the system being studied is divided into a region where quantum mechanics (QM) is used to determine forces for doing Born-Oppenheimer direct dynamics calculations (i.e., doing electronic structure calculations on the fly to determine energies and forces) and another region where empirical potentials that are commonly used in molecular mechanics (MM) calculations are used to determine forces. The two regions are linked through an embedding process that may or may not involve the possibility that atoms can be passed back and forth between regions at each time step. The idea with this dynamic QM/MM methodology is that one uses QM calculations to define the potential surface in portions of the system where reaction occurs, and MM to determine forces in what is typically a much larger region where no reaction occurs. This approach thereby enables the description of chemical reactions in the QM region, which is a technology that can be used in many different applications. We illustrate its use by describing work that we have done with gas-liquid reactions in which a reactive atom (such as an oxygen or fluorine atom) reacts with the surface of a liquid and the products can either remain in the liquid or emerge into the gas phase. Applications to hydrocarbon and ionic liquids are described, including the characterization of reaction mechanisms at hyperthermal energies, and the determination of product branching and product energy distributions.

Modeling reactive scattering of F(2P) at a liquid squalane interface: a hybrid QM/MM molecular dynamics study.

To better understand the reactivity of gases with liquid surfaces, experimentalists have recently probed the reactive scattering of atomic fluorine at the surface of liquid squalane (C(30)H(62)). In this paper we further this research by simulating this scattering process at collision energies of 0.5 and 1.0 eV using a hybrid QM/MM molecular dynamics scheme. To model the structure of the liquid surface, classical molecular dynamics calculations were performed utilizing the OPLS-AA force field. During the F + squalane molecular dynamics simulation, QM/MM calculations are performed at every trajectory step by combining the MSINDO semiempirical Hamiltonian with OPLS-AA and using a dynamic partitioning of the atoms in the QM or MM regions via a "seed atom" method. This computational model provides a type of "on-the-fly" direct dynamics applicable to larger scale chemical processes that include the making/breaking of chemical bonds not available in standard force field models. Our results show that H abstraction is the only reactive scattering pathway and that most trajectories result in reactive scattering. Reaction statistics at the squalane surface are discussed, including variation of the results with incident angle and collision energy, and the probability of reaction as a function of carbon atom type, collision depth, and residence time. Product states, including angular distributions and final translational and rovibrational energies, are also considered and found to be significantly affected by the exothermic reaction energy for H abstraction. The vibrational distributions are in good agreement with recent experiments, but the rotational distributions are dominated by a nonthermal component while the experiments, which involve thermal incident energies, show comparable thermal and nonthermal contributions. Results for O + squalane at 1.0 eV, which we also present, show analogous comparisons with experiment, with OH vibrational distributions which are cold and match experiment, while the calculated rotational distributions are dominated by nonthermal behavior.

Modeling O(3P) and Ar scattering from the ionic liquid [emim][NO3] at 5 eV with hybrid QM/MM molecular dynamics.

In this paper, we develop a hybrid QM/MM-MD direct dynamics method for the study of Ar and O scattering from room-temperature ionic liquids (RTIL) at hyperthermal energies, with the goal of providing an understanding of the reactivity of ionic liquids as potential hypergolic fuels. The RTIL is chosen to be 1-ethyl-3-methylimidazolium nitrate ([emim][NO(3)]) as the bulk properties of this have been analyzed experimentally and theoretically, and a force field has been developed. Within our simulation time of 7.3 ps, Ar collisions with the liquid surface cause 2-3 proton transfers to occur from the imidazolium ring to the anion, and a small fraction of these events leads to the desorption of neutral "emim" or HNO(3) species. These charge-transfer processes also occur for O((3)P) collisions, but in addition, there is a rich amount of chemical change at the surface leading to four main collision types, reaction with NO(3) to form species like [NO(2)] and O(2), O addition to the imidazolium ring causing ring scission, H abstractions from the hydrocarbon chains (ethyl or methyl) or imidazolium ring generating OH, and O atom inelastic scattering. Within the MSINDO model, the major scattered products (all are neutral) from the O collisions, with their probabilities in parentheses, are O (0.13), emim (0.12), HNO(2) (0.05), HNO(3) (0.04), and OH (0.04). Of these products, only OH is unique to O atom collisions; the HNO(2) and HNO(3) products also arise when the incident atom is Ar or O.

Structure and stability of the organo-noble gas molecules XNgCCX and XNgCCNgX (Ng = Kr, Ar; X = F, Cl).

Density functional theory (B3LYP) and ab initio theory [second-order Møller-Plesset perturbation theory (MP2) and coupled-cluster theory including single, double, and quasiperturbative triple excitations (CCSD(T))] have been used in combination with the standard and augmented correlation consistent basis sets (cc-pVnZ and aug-cc-pVnZ, where n = D, T, and Q) to investigate potential new noble gas compounds. Two classes of molecules were studied: XNgCCNgX and XNgCCX, where Ng = Kr and Ar and X = F and Cl. These molecules were characterized by finding the ground-state structures and calculating the relative energies, charge distributions, and vibrational frequencies. In addition, transition-state structures were also determined and decomposition pathways were identified through intrinsic reaction coordinate calculations.

The correlation-consistent composite approach: application to the G3/99 test set.

The correlation-consistent composite approach (ccCA), an ab initio composite technique for computing atomic and molecular energies, recently has been shown to successfully reproduce experimental data for a number of systems. The ccCA is applied to the G3/99 test set, which includes 223 enthalpies of formation, 88 adiabatic ionization potentials, 58 adiabatic electron affinities, and 8 adiabatic proton affinities. Improvements on the original ccCA formalism include replacing the small basis set quadratic configuration interaction computation with a coupled cluster computation, employing a correction for scalar relativistic effects, utilizing the tight-d forms of the second-row correlation-consistent basis sets, and revisiting the basis set chosen for geometry optimization. With two types of complete basis set extrapolation of MP2 energies, ccCA results in an almost zero mean deviation for the G3/99 set (with a best value of -0.10 kcal mol(-1)), and a 0.96 kcal mol(-1) mean absolute deviation, which is equivalent to the accuracy of the G3X model chemistry. There are no optimized or empirical parameters included in the computation of ccCA energies. Except for a few systems to be discussed, ccCA performs as well as or better than Gn methods for most systems containing first-row atoms, while for systems containing second-row atoms, ccCA is an improvement over Gn model chemistries.

Relativistic effects determined using the Douglas-Kroll contracted basis sets and correlation consistent basis sets with small-core relativistic pseudopotentials.

The coupled cluster approximation with single, double, and quasiperturbative triple excitations [CCSD(T)] was used in combination with the Douglas-Kroll contracted correlation consistent basis sets [cc-pVnZ-DK, where n = D(2), T(3), Q(4), and 5] and small-core relativistic pseudopotentials (PP) with correlation consistent polarized valence basis sets (cc-pVnZ-PP and aug-cc-pVnZ-PP) to investigate the impact of scalar relativistic corrections on energetic and structural properties of small molecules containing third-row (Ga-Kr) atoms. These molecules were taken from the Gaussian-2 extended test set for third-row atoms. Atomization energies, ionization energies, electron affinities, and proton affinities for molecules in the test set were determined and compared with nonrelativistic results which were obtained in a recent study in which the standard and augmented correlation consistent basis sets were used in combination with CCSD(T). Several schemes were used to extrapolate the energies to the complete basis set limit.

Accurate energetics of small molecules containing third-row atoms Ga-Kr: a comparison of advanced ab initio and density functional theory.

Advanced ab initio [coupled cluster theory through quasiperturbative triple excitations (CCSD(T))] and density functional (B3LYP) computational chemistry approaches were used in combination with the standard and augmented correlation consistent polarized valence basis sets [cc-pVnZ and aug-cc-pVnZ, where n=D(2), T(3), Q(4), and 5] to investigate the energetic and structural properties of small molecules containing third-row (Ga-Kr) atoms. These molecules were taken from the Gaussian-2 (G2) extended test set for third-row atoms. Several different schemes were used to extrapolate the calculated energies to the complete basis set (CBS) limit for CCSD(T) and the Kohn-Sham (KS) limit for B3LYP. Zero point energy and spin orbital corrections were included in the results. Overall, CCSD(T) atomization energies, ionization energies, proton affinities, and electron affinities are in good agreement with experiment, within 1.1 kcal/mol when the CBS limit has been determined using a series of two basis sets of at least triple zeta quality. For B3LYP, the overall mean absolute deviation from experiment for the three properties and the series of molecules is more significant at the KS limit, within 2.3 and 2.6 kcal/mol for the cc-pVnZ and aug-cc-pVnZ basis set series, respectively.