Mise au point. Theorie des effets de couplage vibronique multimodes. Probleme a 2 etats. Couplage vibronique mettant en jeu des modes et des etats degeneres. Effets du couplage vibronique multimodes en spectroscopie. Comportement statistique des niveaux d'energie vibroniques. Intersections coniques et evolution temporelle de la fluorescence

Multimode molecular dynamics beyond the Born-Oppenheimer approximation

Multimode Molecular Dynamics Beyond the Born‐Oppenheimer Approximation

The fluorescence excitation spectrum of NO2 was measured in the region 5708–6708 A using a tuneable dye laser as an excitation source. The NO2 was cooled to a rotational temperature of ∼3 K by expansion with argon as a carrier gas through a supersonic nozzle. This cooling drastically reduced the rotational structure and thereby permitted a clear separation and analysis of 140 vibronic bands found in this 1000 A region of the spectrum. The results indicate that most of the fluorescence in this region is due to a 2B2 electronic state, and that this state is so heavily perturbed by high lying levels of the ground electronic state that a substantial fraction of all ground state levels of appropriate vibronic symmetry in this region have appreciable fluorescence intensity.

The fluorescence excitation spectrum of rotationally cooled NO2

As the scope of quantum chemistry broadened from the consideration of stable molecules near equilibrium to encompass potential curves and surfaces, transition states, radicals, ions, and excited states, the shortcomings of the Hartree— Fock (HF) approximation for the description of the electronic structure of molecular systems became increasingly evident. The energy error of the restricted HF wave function, i.e., the difference between the HF limit energy (which is the limit approached by restricted self-consistent field calculations as the basis set approaches completeness) and the exact solution of the nonrelativistic Schrodinger equation, has been termed the correlation energy.(1) It reflects the fact that the HF Hamiltonian contains the average, rather than instantaneous, interelectron potential, and thus neglects the correlation between the motions of the electrons.

The Method of Configuration Interaction

The 2A1 ground state of NO2 and the so‐called 2B2 excited state are shown to form a strongly coupled pair of 2A′ states when asymmetric distortion is considered. This coupling is of the Jahn–Teller type although the degeneracy between the states is accidental and the normal coordinates are not equivalent.

The two lowest energy 2A′ states of NO2

Traditional spectroscopic analysis of the complex and irregular absorption spectrum of NO2 has provided a relatively small amount of information concerning the nature of the excited states. An extensive ab initio investigation has been undertaken, therefore, to provide a basis for interpretation of the experimental results. Multiconfiguration self‐consistent‐field (MC–SCF) wavefunctions have been computed for the low‐lying X 2A1, A 2B2, B 2B1, C 2A2, 4B2, 4A2, and 2Σ+g electronic states of NO2. The minima of the A 2B2, B 2B1, and C 2A2 states have all been found to be within 2 eV of the minimum of the X 2A1 ground state; for these states, C2v potential surfaces have been constructed for purposes of a spectral interpretation. The 4B2, 4A2, and 2Σ+g states are all more than 4 eV above the minimum of the ground state and have been examined in less detail. The study described here significantly improves on previous NO2 ab initio calculations in three important areas: (1) The double‐zeta‐plus‐polarization quality basis set is larger and more flexible; (2) the treatment of molecular correlation is more extensive; and (3) the electronic energies have been calculated for several different bond lengths and bond angles in each state. For the four lowest doublet states the following spectral data have been obtained: The ground state experimental constants are included in parentheses. The estimated accuracy of the various parameters is ±0.02 A for bond length, ±2° for bond angle, ±10% for the vibrational frequencies, ±0.10 D for dipole moments, and ±0.3 eV for the adiabatic excitation energies. An unusual feature has been found for the 2Σ+g state. The equilibrium geometry of this linear state has two unequal bond lengths of 1.20 A and 1.42 A and the inversion barrier is approximately 800 cm−1.

Arnold C. Wahl

Papers

The electronic structure of nitrogen dioxide. I. Multiconfiguration self‐consistent‐field calculation of the low‐lying electronic states