Theoretical Study on Aggregation of Nuclei-Containing Gas Phase

Author(s):  
Zhong Lan ◽  
Quan Xue ◽  
Xuehu Ma ◽  
Di Wang ◽  
Kejian Cao ◽  
...  

Haze is a kind of typical heterogeneous nucleation phenomenon in gas phase condensation process. The existence of dust nucleus may induce water molecule aggregation among vapor phase under a certain humidity. In this article, we try to use Density Functional Theory simulation to explore the evolution mechanism of water molecule aggregation influenced by condensation nucleus from the perspective of molecules assembling. We can get the following results: the subcooling degree and physicochemical properties of nucleation center affect the hydrogen bond within the water clusters and the transformation energy barrier of water molecule aggregation tendency. Water vapor begins to heterogeneously condense or forms aggregation humidity in a certain condition based on the center of condensation nuclei. The analysis shows that the effect law of the degree and scale of aggregation or phase transition are influenced by the change of gas phase partial pressure, supersaturated degree along with particle properties. As the energy barrier of nucleation free energy decreases, the formation of water clusters will be easier.

2018 ◽  
Vol 17 (08) ◽  
pp. 1850050 ◽  
Author(s):  
Qiuhan Luo ◽  
Gang Li ◽  
Junping Xiao ◽  
Chunhui Yin ◽  
Yahui He ◽  
...  

Sulfonylureas are an important group of herbicides widely used for a range of weeds and grasses control particularly in cereals. However, some of them tend to persist for years in environments. Hydrolysis is the primary pathway for their degradation. To understand the hydrolysis behavior of sulfonylurea herbicides, the hydrolysis mechanism of metsulfuron-methyl, a typical sulfonylurea, was investigated using density functional theory (DFT) at the B3LYP/6-31[Formula: see text]G(d,p) level. The hydrolysis of metsulfuron-methyl resembles nucleophilic substitution by a water molecule attacking the carbonyl group from aryl side (pathway a) or from heterocycle side (pathway b). In the direct hydrolysis, the carbonyl group is directly attacked by one water molecule to form benzene sulfonamide or heterocyclic amine; the free energy barrier is about 52–58[Formula: see text]kcal[Formula: see text]mol[Formula: see text]. In the autocatalytic hydrolysis, with the second water molecule acting as a catalyst, the free energy barrier, which is about 43–45[Formula: see text]kcal[Formula: see text]mol[Formula: see text], is remarkably reduced by about 11[Formula: see text]kcal[Formula: see text]mol[Formula: see text]. It is obvious that water molecules play a significant catalytic role during the hydrolysis of sulfonylureas.


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zoi Salta ◽  
Agnie M. Kosmas ◽  
Oscar Ventura ◽  
Vincenzo Barone

<p>The dehalogenation of 2-chloroethanol (2ClEtOH) in gas phase with and without participation of catalytic water molecules has been investigated using methods rooted into the density functional theory. The well-known HCl elimination leading to vinyl alcohol (VA) was compared to the alternative elimination route towards oxirane and shown to be kinetically and thermodynamically more favorable. However, the isomerization of VA to acetaldehyde in the gas phase, in the absence of water, was shown to be kinetically and thermodynamically less favorable than the recombination of VA and HCl to form the isomeric 1-chloroethanol (1ClEtOH) species. This species is more stable than 2ClEtOH by about 6 kcal mol<sup>-1</sup>, and the reaction barrier is 22 kcal mol<sup>-1</sup> vs 55 kcal mol<sup>-1</sup> for the direct transformation of VA to acetaldehyde. In a successive step, 1ClEtOH can decompose directly to acetaldehyde and HCl with a lower barrier (29 kcal mol<sup>-1</sup>) than that of VA to the same products (55 kcal mol<sup>-1</sup>). The calculations were repeated using a single ancillary water molecule (W) in the complexes 2ClEtOH_W and 1ClEtOH_W. The latter adduct is now more stable than 2ClEtOH_W by about 8 kcal mol<sup>-1</sup>, implying that the water molecule increased the already higher stability of 1ClEtOH in the gas phase. However, this catalytic water molecule lowers dramatically the barrier for the interconversion of VA to acetaldehyde (from 55 to 6 kcal mol<sup>-1</sup>). This barrier is now smaller than the one for the conversion to 1ClEtOH (which also decreases, but not so much, from 22 to 12 kcal mol<sup>-1</sup>). Thus, it is concluded that while 1ClEtOH may be a plausible intermediate in the gas phase dehalogenation of 2ClEtOH, it is unlikely that it plays a major role in water complexes (or, by inference, aqueous solution). It is also shown that neither in the gas phase nor in the cluster with one water molecule, the oxirane path is competitive with the VA alcohol path.</p>


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hung Le ◽  
Mariano Guagliardo ◽  
Anne Gorden ◽  
Aurora Clark

<div>Umbrella-sampling density functional theory molecular dynamics (DFT-MD) has been employed to study the full catalytic cycle of the allylic oxidation of cyclohexene</div><div>using a Cu(II) (E)-6-amino-7-((2-hydroxybenzylidene)amino)quinoxalin-2-ol complex in acetonitrile, which creates the desired cyclohexenone and H 2 O as products. In comparison to prior study using gas-phase DFT, a significant solvent effect is observed on the rate determining allylic H-atom abstraction step (which has a free energy barrier of 12.1 ± 0.2 kcal/mol). During the cycle, the explicit solvation and ensemble sampling of solvent configurations reveals an important dehydrogenation and re-hydrogenation step of the -NH 2 ligand that is essential to catalyst recovery. This work illustrates the importance of ensemble solvent configurational sampling to reveal the breadth of processes that underpin the full catalytic cycle.</div>


2013 ◽  
Vol 781-784 ◽  
pp. 253-258
Author(s):  
Ming Zhi Song ◽  
Zai Long Zhang ◽  
Chuan Gang Fan ◽  
Da Zhi Li ◽  
Shi Guo Zhang

The decarboxylation mechanism of oxaloacetic acid aided with ethylenediamine or without any catalyst is investigated employing Density Functional Theory (DFT). DFT calculations for both the gas phase and in water solution indicate a stepwise mechanism for each of the steps of the reactions. In the catalyzed mechanism, the dehydration of carbinolamine (IM1) is via a seven-membered ring transition structure (TS5), which is consistent with the structure proposed by Thalji, et al. The decarboxylation of the imine (IM6) is the rate determining step with an energy barrier of 16.46 kcal/mol, lower than the reaction without any catalysts or catalyzed with ions.


2020 ◽  
Vol 493 (2) ◽  
pp. 2523-2527 ◽  
Author(s):  
J Enrique-Romero ◽  
S Álvarez-Barcia ◽  
F J Kolb ◽  
A Rimola ◽  
C Ceccarelli ◽  
...  

ABSTRACT The formation of interstellar complex organic molecules is currently thought to be dominated by the barrierless coupling between radicals on the interstellar icy grain surfaces. Previous standard density functional theory (DFT) results on the reactivity between CH3 and HCO on amorphous water surfaces showed that the formation of CH4 + CO by H transfer from HCO to CH3 assisted by water molecules of the ice was the dominant channel. However, the adopted description of the electronic structure of the biradical (i.e. CH3/HCO) system was inadequate [without the broken-symmetry (BS) approach]. In this work, we revisit the original results by means of BS-DFT both in gas phase and with one water molecule simulating the role of the ice. Results indicate that the adoption of BS-DFT is mandatory to describe properly biradical systems. In the presence of the single water molecule, the water-assisted H transfer exhibits a high energy barrier. In contrast, CH3CHO formation is found to be barrierless. However, direct H transfer from HCO to CH3 to give CO and CH4 presents a very low energy barrier, hence being a potential competitive channel to the radical coupling and indicating, moreover, that the physical insights of the original work remain valid.


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zoi Salta ◽  
Agnie M. Kosmas ◽  
Oscar Ventura ◽  
Vincenzo Barone

<p>The dehalogenation of 2-chloroethanol (2ClEtOH) in gas phase with and without participation of catalytic water molecules has been investigated using methods rooted into the density functional theory. The well-known HCl elimination leading to vinyl alcohol (VA) was compared to the alternative elimination route towards oxirane and shown to be kinetically and thermodynamically more favorable. However, the isomerization of VA to acetaldehyde in the gas phase, in the absence of water, was shown to be kinetically and thermodynamically less favorable than the recombination of VA and HCl to form the isomeric 1-chloroethanol (1ClEtOH) species. This species is more stable than 2ClEtOH by about 6 kcal mol<sup>-1</sup>, and the reaction barrier is 22 kcal mol<sup>-1</sup> vs 55 kcal mol<sup>-1</sup> for the direct transformation of VA to acetaldehyde. In a successive step, 1ClEtOH can decompose directly to acetaldehyde and HCl with a lower barrier (29 kcal mol<sup>-1</sup>) than that of VA to the same products (55 kcal mol<sup>-1</sup>). The calculations were repeated using a single ancillary water molecule (W) in the complexes 2ClEtOH_W and 1ClEtOH_W. The latter adduct is now more stable than 2ClEtOH_W by about 8 kcal mol<sup>-1</sup>, implying that the water molecule increased the already higher stability of 1ClEtOH in the gas phase. However, this catalytic water molecule lowers dramatically the barrier for the interconversion of VA to acetaldehyde (from 55 to 6 kcal mol<sup>-1</sup>). This barrier is now smaller than the one for the conversion to 1ClEtOH (which also decreases, but not so much, from 22 to 12 kcal mol<sup>-1</sup>). Thus, it is concluded that while 1ClEtOH may be a plausible intermediate in the gas phase dehalogenation of 2ClEtOH, it is unlikely that it plays a major role in water complexes (or, by inference, aqueous solution). It is also shown that neither in the gas phase nor in the cluster with one water molecule, the oxirane path is competitive with the VA alcohol path.</p>


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hung Le ◽  
Mariano Guagliardo ◽  
Anne Gorden ◽  
Aurora Clark

<div>Umbrella-sampling density functional theory molecular dynamics (DFT-MD) has been employed to study the full catalytic cycle of the allylic oxidation of cyclohexene</div><div>using a Cu(II) (E)-6-amino-7-((2-hydroxybenzylidene)amino)quinoxalin-2-ol complex in acetonitrile, which creates the desired cyclohexenone and H 2 O as products. In comparison to prior study using gas-phase DFT, a significant solvent effect is observed on the rate determining allylic H-atom abstraction step (which has a free energy barrier of 12.1 ± 0.2 kcal/mol). During the cycle, the explicit solvation and ensemble sampling of solvent configurations reveals an important dehydrogenation and re-hydrogenation step of the -NH 2 ligand that is essential to catalyst recovery. This work illustrates the importance of ensemble solvent configurational sampling to reveal the breadth of processes that underpin the full catalytic cycle.</div>


2009 ◽  
Vol 08 (supp01) ◽  
pp. 1087-1098
Author(s):  
LAI-CAI LI ◽  
YING ZHANG ◽  
AN-MIN TIAN ◽  
NING-BEW WONG

The reaction mechanism of CuI -catalyzed formation of ethyl 2-phenylacetoacetate by arylation of ethyl acetoacetate has been investigated by density functional theory (DFT) using Becke's three-parameter nonlocal exchange functional and the Lee, Yang, and Parr nonlocal correlation functional (B3LYP). The geometries of the reactants, intermediates, transition states, and products have been optimized and verified by means of vibration frequency calculations. According to our assumption, this reaction can be divided into two stages. The rate-determining step is found to be the 3 → 4-TS procedure, which is the first procedure of stage 1. The low energy barrier of 39.85 kcal/mol indicates that this reaction can be carried out, which is in accordance with the experimental facts. For comparison, we have investigated the reaction mechanism of the same chemical reaction without CuI catalyst, whose energy barrier of rate-determining step is 212.76 kcal/mol higher than that with CuI catalyst. This fact suggests that CuI catalyst accelerates the reaction by remarkably lowering the energy barrier. The solvation effects on the barriers of the reaction are important. But the energetic order in DMSO solvent seems to be almost the same as that in gas-phase, which indicates that our conclusion achieved in gas-phase is believable. Our findings reveal the microscopic catalytic mechanism of CuI and are in agreement with the experimental facts.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hung Le ◽  
Mariano Guagliardo ◽  
Anne Gorden ◽  
Aurora Clark

Umbrella-sampling density functional theory molecular dynamics (DFT-MD) has been employed to study the full catalytic cycle of the allylic oxidation of cyclohexene using a Cu(II) 7-amino-6-((2-hydroxybenzylidene)amino)quinoxalin-2-ol complex in acetonitrile to create cyclohexenone and H$_2$O as products. In comparison to gas-phase DFT, the solvent effect is observed as the rate determining allylic H-atom abstraction step has a free energy barrier of 12.1 $\pm$ 0.2 kcal/mol in solution. During the cycle, the explicit solvation and ensemble sampling of solvent configurations reveals important dehydrogenation and re-hydrogenation steps of the -NH$_2$ group bound to the Cu-site that are essential to catalyst recovery. This work illustrates the importance of ensemble solvent configurational sampling to reveal the breadth of processes that underpin the full catalytic cycle.<br>


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Drew P. Harding ◽  
Laura J. Kingsley ◽  
Glen Spraggon ◽  
Steven Wheeler

The intrinsic (gas-phase) stacking energies of natural and artificial nucleobases were explored using density functional theory (DFT) and correlated ab initio methods. Ranking the stacking strength of natural nucleobase dimers revealed a preference in binding partner similar to that seen from experiments, namely G > C > A > T > U. Decomposition of these interaction energies using symmetry-adapted perturbation theory (SAPT) showed that these dispersion dominated interactions are modulated by electrostatics. Artificial nucleobases showed a similar stacking preference for natural nucleobases and were also modulated by electrostatic interactions. A robust predictive multivariate model was developed that quantitively predicts the maximum stacking interaction between natural and a wide range of artificial nucleobases using molecular descriptors based on computed electrostatic potentials (ESPs) and the number of heavy atoms. This model should find utility in designing artificial nucleobase analogs that exhibit stacking interactions comparable to those of natural nucleobases. Further analysis of the descriptors in this model unveil the origin of superior stacking abilities of certain nucleobases, including cytosine and guanine.


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