A Water-Promoted Mars-van Krevelen Reaction Dominates Low-Temperature CO Oxidation over Au-Fe2O3 but Not over Au-TiO2.

We provide experimental evidence that is inconsistent with often proposed Langmuir-Hinshelwood (LH) mechanistic hypotheses for water-promoted CO oxidation over Au-Fe2O3. Passing CO and H2O, but no O2, over Au-γ-Fe2O3 at 25 °C, we observe significant CO2 production, inconsistent with LH mechanistic hypotheses. Experiments with H218O further show that previous LH mechanistic proposals cannot account for water-promoted CO oxidation over Au-γ-Fe2O3. Guided by density functional theory, we instead postulate a water-promoted Mars-van Krevelen (w-MvK) reaction. Our proposed w-MvK mechanism is consistent both with observed CO2 production in the absence of O2 and with CO oxidation in the presence of H218O and 16O2. In contrast, for Au-TiO2, our data is consistent with previous LH mechanistic hypotheses.

A nuclear configuration interaction approach to study nuclear spin effects: an application to ortho- and para-3 He2 @C60.

We introduce a non-orthogonal configuration interaction approach to investigate nuclear quantum effects on energies and densities of confined fermionic nuclei. The Hamiltonian employed draws parallels between confined systems and many-electron atoms, where effective non-Coulombic potentials represent the interactions of the trapped particles. One advantage of this method is its generality, as it offers the potential to study the nuclear quantum effects of various confined species affected by effective isotropic or anisotropic potentials. As a first application, we analyze the quantum states of two 3 He atoms encapsulated in C60 . At the Hartree-Fock level, we observe the breaking of spin and spatial symmetries. To ensure wavefunctions with the correct symmetries, we mix the broken-symmetry Hartree-Fock states within the non-orthogonal configuration interaction expansion. Our proposed approach predicts singly and triply degenerate ground states for the singlet (para-3 He2 @C60 ) and triplet (ortho-3 He2 @C60 ) nuclear spin configurations, respectively. The ortho-3 He2 @C60 ground state is 5.69 cm-1 higher in energy than the para-3 He2 @C60 ground state. The nuclear densities obtained for these states exhibit the icosahedral symmetry of the C60 embedding potential. Importantly, our calculated energies for the lowest 85 states are in close agreement with perturbation theory results based on a harmonic oscillator plus rigid rotor model of 3 He2 @C60 .

Multicomponent wavefunction-in-DFT embedding for positronium molecules.

This work presents an extension of the projector operator embedding scheme of Manby et al. [J. Chem. Theory Comput. 8, 2564 (2012)] in a multicomponent (MC) framework. Here, a molecular system containing electrons and other types of quantum species is divided into a wavefunction (WF) subsystem of interest and a density functional theory (DFT) environment. The WF-in-DFT partition decreases computational costs by partially truncating the WF subsystem basis set at the cost of introducing a controllable embedding error. To explore the applicability of the MC extension, third-order propagator-in-DFT calculations were performed for positron-anion complexes for alkoxides and carboxylates with carbon chains of different sizes. For these systems, it was found that selecting a WF subsystem with the positron and only the oxygen atoms caused an error of 0.1 eV or lower in positron-binding energies, while reducing between 33% and 55% the basis set size. The reduction of computational costs achieved with the embedding scheme allowed us to improve molecular positron-binding energy predictions by performing complete basis set limit extrapolations. Combining the WF-in-DFT embedding and the complete basis set extrapolation, positronium aliphatic alkoxides were predicted to be energetically stable by 0.3 eV with respect to Ps emission. Similarly, positronium carboxylates, both aromatic and aliphatic, were predicted to be stable by 1.3 eV.

The three-center two-positron bond.

Computational studies have shown that one or more positrons can stabilize two repelling atomic anions through the formation of two-center positronic bonds. In the present work, we study the energetic stability of a system containing two positrons and three hydride anions, namely 2e+[H3 3-]. To this aim, we performed a preliminary scan of the potential energy surface of the system with both electrons and positrons in a spin singlet state, with a multi-component MP2 method, that was further refined with variational and diffusion Monte Carlo calculations, and confirmed an equilibrium geometry with D 3h symmetry. The local stability of 2e+[H3 3-] is demonstrated by analyzing the vertical detachment and adiabatic energy dissociation channels. Bonding properties of the positronic compound, such as the equilibrium interatomic distances, force constants, dissociation energies, and bonding densities are compared with those of the purely electronic H3 + and Li3 + systems. Through this analysis, we find compelling similarities between the 2e+[H3 3-] compound and the trilithium cation. Our results strongly point out the formation of a non-electronic three-center two-positron bond, analogous to the well-known three-center two-electron counterparts, which is fundamentally distinct from the two-center two-positron bond [D. Bressanini, J. Chem. Phys., 2021, 155, 054306], thus extending the concept of positron bonded molecules.

Design, synthesis, theoretical study, antioxidant, and anticholinesterase activities of new pyrazolo-fused phenanthrolines.

Pyrazole-fused phenanthroline compounds were obtained through several synthetic routes. NMR, HRMS, and IR techniques were used to characterize and confirm the chemical structures. Crystal structures were obtained from compounds 3a, 5b, 5j, 5k, and 5n and analyzed using X-ray diffraction. Compounds were evaluated as acetyl (AChE) and butyrylcholinesterase (BChE) inhibitors, and the results showed a moderate activity. Compound 5c presented the best activity against AChE (IC50 = 53.29 µM) and compound 5l against BChE enzyme (IC50 = 119.3 µM). Furthermore, the ability of the synthetic compounds to scavenge cationic radicals DPPH and ABTS was evaluated. Compound 5e (EC50 = 26.71 µg mL-1) presented the best results in the DPPH assay, and compounds 5e, 5f and 5g (EC50 = 11.51, 3.10 and <3 µg mL-1, respectively) showed better ABTS cationic radical scavenging results. Finally, in silico analyses indicated that 71% of the compounds show good oral availability and are within the ranges established by the Lipinski criteria.

Covalent bonds in positron dihalides.

We report a computational study on homo- and heteronuclear e+[X-Y-] compounds formed by two halide anions (X-, Y- = F-, Cl-, Br-) and one positron. Our results indicate the formation of energetically stable positronic molecules in all cases. Analysis of the electron and positron densities points out that the formation of positron covalent bonds underlies the stabilization of the otherwise repelling dihalides, revealing that positronic bonding can reach far beyond the previously addressed e+[H-H-] molecule [J. Charry, M. T. do N. Varella and A. Reyes, Angew. Chem. Int. Ed., 2018, 57, 8859-8864.]. To a significant extent, the properties of the positron dihalides are similar to those of the purely electronic analogs, e-[A+B+], molecular cations with isoelectronic atomic cores (A+, B+ = Na+, K+, Rb+) bound by one electron. The positron bonds in the e+[X-Y-] complexes are however stronger than those in the isoelectronic e-[A+B+] counterparts, as the former have shorter bond lengths and higher bond energies. While an energy decomposition analysis points out that both electronic and positronic bonds essentially arise from electrostatic interactions, the more stable positron bonds are partly due to the higher polarizabilities of the dihalide anions, and partly to more significant contributions from correlation and relaxation effects.

Spectroscopic and Time-Dependent DFT Study of the Photophysical Properties of Substituted 1,4-Distyrylbenzenes.

In this contribution, we examine the photophysical properties of 15 totally trans-trans 1,4-distyrylbenzene derivatives (DSBs) functionalized with different electron-donating (ED) and electron-withdrawing (EW) groups by experimental and computational methodologies. We use UV-vis and fluorescence spectroscopies to determine the experimental optical properties such as the maximum absorption (λabsexp) and emission (λemexp) wavelengths, the highest occupied molecular orbital-lowest unoccupied molecular orbital (HOMO-LUMO) energy gaps (ΔEabsexp), the molar extinction coefficients (ε), the fluorescence quantum yields (Φf), and the fluorescence lifetimes (τ). We also calculate the experimental spontaneous emission decay rate (krexp) and correlate all of these magnitudes to the corresponding calculated properties, maximum absorption (λabscal) and emission (λemcal) wavelengths, vertical transition energies (ΔEabscal), oscillator strength (Fosc), and spontaneous emission decay rate (krcal), obtained by the time-dependent density functional theory method. We analyze the effect of the electronic nature of the substituents on the properties of the DSBs, finding that the ED and EW groups lead to bathochromic shifts. This is consistent with the decrease of ΔE values as the strength of ED and EW substituents increases. We find excellent correlations between calculated and experimental values for λabs, λem, and ΔEabs (r ∼ 0.99-0.95). Additionally, the correlations between the relative ε with Fosc values and the kr values are in good agreement (r ∼ 0.88-0.72) with the experimental properties. Overall, we find that for substituted 1,4-DSBs, computational chemistry is an excellent tool to predict structure-property relationships, which can be useful to forecast the properties of their polymeric analogues, which are usually difficult to determine experimentally.

The any particle molecular orbital grid-based Hartree-Fock (APMO-GBHF) approach.

The any particle molecular orbital grid-based Hartree-Fock approach (APMO-GBHF) is proposed as an initial step to perform multi-component post-Hartree-Fock, explicitly correlated, and density functional theory methods without basis set errors. The method has been applied to a number of electronic and multi-species molecular systems. Results of these calculations show that the APMO-GBHF total energies are comparable with those obtained at the APMO-HF complete basis set limit. In addition, results reveal a considerable improvement in the description of the nuclear cusps of electronic and non-electronic densities.

Theoretical calculation of polarizability isotope effects.

We propose a scheme to estimate hydrogen isotope effects on molecular polarizabilities. This approach combines the any-particle molecular orbital method, in which both electrons and H/D nuclei are described as quantum waves, with the auxiliary density perturbation theory, to calculate analytically the polarizability tensor. We assess the performance of method by calculating the polarizability isotope effect for 20 molecules. A good correlation between theoretical and experimental data is found. Further analysis of the results reveals that the change in the polarizability of a X-H bond upon deuteration decreases as the electronegativity of X increases. Our investigation also reveals that the molecular polarizability isotope effect presents an additive character. Therefore, it can be computed by counting the number of deuterated bonds in the molecule.

Negative muon chemistry: the quantum muon effect and the finite nuclear mass effect.

The any-particle molecular orbital method at the full configuration interaction level has been employed to study atoms in which one electron has been replaced by a negative muon. In this approach electrons and muons are described as quantum waves. A scheme has been proposed to discriminate nuclear mass and quantum muon effects on chemical properties of muonic and regular atoms. This study reveals that the differences in the ionization potentials of isoelectronic muonic atoms and regular atoms are of the order of millielectronvolts. For the valence ionizations of muonic helium and muonic lithium the nuclear mass effects are more important. On the other hand, for 1s ionizations of muonic atoms heavier than beryllium, the quantum muon effects are more important. In addition, this study presents an assessment of the nuclear mass and quantum muon effects on the barrier of Heµ + H2 reaction.

ESTUDIO EXPERIMENTAL Y COMPUTACIONAL DE POLÍGONOS SUPRAMOLECULARES DE Ni, Pd Y Pt, AUTOENSAMBLADOS CON 4,4'-BIPIRIDINA. / EXPERIMENTAL AND COMPUTATIONAL STUDIES OF Ni, Pd AND Pt SUPRAMOLECULAR POLYGONS, SELF-ASSEMBLED WITH 4,4'-BIPYRIDINE. / ESTUDOS EXPERIMENTAIS E COMPUTACIONAIS DE POLIGONOS SUPRAMOLECULARES Ni, Pd e Pt, AUTO-MONTADOS COM 4,4-BIPIRIDINA.

Los polígonos y poliedros supramoleculares presentan diversas y novedosas aplicaciones como nanoreactores, en química de inclusión, nanosensores moleculares, entre otras. En este trabajo se presenta la síntesis, caracterización y comparación de polígonos supramoleculares autoensamblados entre complejos de tipo [M(dppe)(TOF)2], con centros metálicos de un mismo grupo (M = Ni, Pd y Pt) y la molécula orgánica 4,4'-bipiridina. Los análisis realizados por Uv-vis, FT-IR, Raman, ¹H-, 31P-, ¹H COSY- y 19F- RMN, demostraron que el complejo que contiene níquel formó únicamente un cuadrado, mientras que los complejos que contienen paladio y platino presentaron un equilibrio triángulo-cuadrado. Además se realizaron cálculos PM6 para los complejos supramoleculares, considerando sistemas catíonicos y neutros, tanto en fase gaseosa como en disolución. Los resultados muestran que para los tres metales, sin importar el medio, se ve favorecida energéticamente la formación de cuadrados en comparación con la formación de triángulos. Además, se observa que los centros de Ni favorecen más la formación de cuadrados, mientras que los centros de Pd la favorecen menos. Las tendencias teóricas se encuentran en concordancia con los resultados experimentales.

Os poligonos e poliedros supramoleculares apresentam diversas e novas aplicacoes como nanoreatores, em quimica de inclusao, nanosensores moleculares, entre outras. Neste trabalho apresenta-se a sintese, caracterizacao e comparacao de polígonos supramoleculares automontados entre complexos de tipo [M(dppe)(TOF)2], com centros metalicos de um mesmo grupo (M = Ni, Pd y Pt) e a molecula organica 4,4'-bipiridina. Os analises realizados por Uv-vis, FT-IR, Raman, ¹H-, 31P-, ¹H COSY- y 19F- RMN, demonstraram que o complexo que contem niquel formou unicamente um quadrado, enquanto que os complexos que contem paladio e platino apresentaram um equilibrio triangulo-quadrado. Adicionalmente, realizaram-se calculos PM6 para os complexos supramoleculares, considerando sistemas cationicos e neutros, tanto em fase gasosa como em dissolucao. Os resultados mostram que para os tres metais, sem importar o meio, vesse favorecida energeticamente a formacao de quadrados em comparacao com a formacao de triangulos. Finalmente, foi observado que os centros de Ni favorecem mais a formacao de quadrados, enquanto que os centros de Pd sao menos favorecidos. As tendencias teoricas mostraram concordancia com os resultados experimentais.

Supramolecular polygons and polyhedral have many novel applications such as nanoreactors, molecular nanosensors, Host-guest chemistry, among others. In this work is presented the synthesis, characterization and comparison of supramolecular polygons selfassembled between complexes of type [M(dppe)(TOF)2], which have metal centers in the same group (M = Ni, Pd and Pt) and the organic molecule 4,4'-bipyridine. Analyses by UV -Vis, FT-IR, Raman, ¹H-, 31P -, ¹H COSY- and 19F- NMR, showed that the nickel-containing complex only formed a square, while the palladium- and platinum-containing complexes formed a triangle-square equilibrium. In addition, PM6 calculations for the supramolecular complexes, considering cationic and neutral systems in the gas phase and in solution, were performed. These results reveal that for the three metals, regardless of the environment, the formation of squares is energetically favored over the formation of triangles. Furthermore, it is observed that the Ni centers favor more the formation of squares, whereas the Pt centers favor it less. These theoretical trends are in good agreement with the experimental results.

Estudio experimental y teórico de polígonos supramoleculares de ni, pd y pt, autoensamblados con 4,4'-bipiridina / Estudo experimental e teórico de polígonos supramoleculares de ni, pd y pt, automontados con 4,4'-bipiridina / Experimental and theoretical studies of ni, pd and pt supramolecular polygons, self-assembled with 4,4'-bipyridine

Los polígonos y poliedros supramoleculares presentan diversas y novedosas aplicaciones como nanoreactores, en química de inclusión, nanosensores moleculares, entre otras. En este trabajo se presenta la síntesis, caracterización y comparación de polígonos supramoleculares autoensamblados entre complejos de tipo [M(dppe)(TOF)2], con centros metálicos de un mismo grupo (M = Ni, Pd y Pt) y la molécula orgánica 4,4'-bipiridina. Los análisis realizados por Uv-vis, FT-IR, Raman, ¹H-, 31P-, ¹H COSY- y 19F- RMN, demostraron que el complejo que contiene níquel formó únicamente un cuadrado, mientras que los complejos que contienen paladio y platino presentaron un equilibrio triángulo-cuadrado. Además se realizaron cálculos PM6 para los complejos supramoleculares, considerando sistemas catíonicos y neutros, tanto en fase gaseosa como en disolución. Los resultados muestran que para los tres metales, sin importar el medio, se ve favorecida energéticamente la formación de cuadrados en comparación con la formación de triángulos. Además, se observa que los centros de Ni favorecen más la formación de cuadrados, mientras que los centros de Pd la favorecen menos. Las tendencias teóricas se encuentran en concordancia con los resultados experimentales.

Os poligonos e poliedros supramoleculares apresentam diversas e novas aplicacoes como nanoreatores, em quimica de inclusao, nanosensores moleculares, entre outras. Neste trabalho apresenta-se a sintese, caracterizacao e comparacao de polígonos supramoleculares automontados entre complexos de tipo [M(dppe)(TOF)2], com centros metalicos de um mesmo grupo (M = Ni, Pd y Pt) e a molecula organica 4,4'-bipiridina. Os analises realizados por Uv-vis, FT-IR, Raman, ¹H-, 31P-, ¹H COSY- y 19F- RMN, demonstraram que o complexo que contem niquel formou unicamente um quadrado, enquanto que os complexos que contem paladio e platino apresentaram um equilibrio triangulo-quadrado. Adicionalmente, realizaram-se calculos PM6 para os complexos supramoleculares, considerando sistemas cationicos e neutros, tanto em fase gasosa como em dissolucao. Os resultados mostram que para os tres metais, sem importar o meio, vesse favorecida energeticamente a formacao de quadrados em comparacao com a formacao de triangulos. Finalmente, foi observado que os centros de Ni favorecem mais a formacao de quadrados, enquanto que os centros de Pd sao menos favorecidos. As tendencias teoricas mostraram concordancia com os resultados experimentais.

Supramolecular polygons and polyhedral have many novel applications such as nanoreactors, molecular nanosensors, Host-guest chemistry, among others. In this work is presented the synthesis, characterization and comparison of supramolecular polygons selfassembled between complexes of type [M(dppe)(TOF)2], which have metal centers in the same group (M = Ni, Pd and Pt) and the organic molecule 4,4'-bipyridine. Analyses by UV -Vis, FT-IR, Raman, ¹H-, 31P -, ¹H COSY- and 19F- NMR, showed that the nickel-containing complex only formed a square, while the palladium- and platinum-containing complexes formed a triangle-square equilibrium. In addition, PM6 calculations for the supramolecular complexes, considering cationic and neutral systems in the gas phase and in solution, were performed. These results reveal that for the three metals, regardless of the environment, the formation of squares is energetically favored over the formation of triangles. Furthermore, it is observed that the Ni centers favor more the formation of squares, whereas the Pt centers favor it less. These theoretical trends are in good agreement with the experimental results.