Polarization effects on the electric properties of urea and thiourea molecules in solid phase.

We present theoretical results for the dipole moment, linear polarizability, and first hyperpolarizability of the urea and thiourea molecules in solid phase. The in-crystal electric properties were determined by applying a supermolecule approach in combination with an iterative electrostatic scheme, in which the surrounding molecules are represented by point charges. It is found for both urea and thiourea molecules that the influence of the polarization effects is mild for the linear polarizability, but it is marked for the dipole moment and first hyperpolarizability. The replacement of oxygen atoms by sulfur atoms increases, in general, the electric responses. Our second-order Møller-Plesset perturbation theory based iterative scheme predicts for the in-crystal dipole moment of urea and thiourea the values of 7.54 and 9.19 D which are, respectively, increased by 61% and 58%, in comparison with the corresponding isolated values. The result for urea is in agreement with the available experimental result of 6.56 D. In addition, we present an estimate of macroscopic quantities considering explicit unit cells of urea and thiourea crystals including environment polarization effects. These supermolecule calculations take into account partially the exchange and dispersion effects. The results illustrate the role played by the electrostatic interactions on the static second-order nonlinear susceptibility of the urea crystal.

A theoretical investigation of electric properties of L-arginine phosphate monohydrate including environment polarization effects.

The dipole moment (µ), linear polarizability (α), and first hyperpolarizability (ß(tot)) of the asymmetric unit of L-arginine phosphate (LAP) monohydrate crystal are investigated using the supermolecule approach in combination with an iterative electrostatic polarization scheme. Environment polarization effects are attained by assuring the convergence of the dipole moment of LAP embedded in the polarization field of the surrounding molecules whose atomic sites are treated as point charges. The results obtained show that in the presence of the embedding charges, the value of µ is increased by 9% but the static values of α and ß(tot) are decreased, respectively, by 3% and 13%, as compared with the isolated situation. The MP2/6-311+G(d) model predicts for the in-crystal dipole moment the converged value of 33 D, in good concordance with the available experimental result of 32 D. Our estimates for the converged results of α and ß(tot) are, respectively, 22.51×10(-24) and 5.01×10(-30) esu. Dispersion effects are found to have a small impact on the nonlinear optical responses of LAP in the visible region. In addition, MP2/6-311G results obtained for ß(tot) by using isolated and embedded LAP dimers show that crystal packing effects have a significant contribution of the electrostatic interactions. Our results suggest that the role of the crystal environment is to minimize the effects of the intermolecular interactions in the electric properties. That is, µ and ß(tot) gain a more additive character in the presence of the field of the embedding charges. This is specially marked for ß(tot).

Polarization and spectral shift of benzophenone in supercritical water.

Monte Carlo simulation and quantum mechanics calculations based on the INDO/CIS and TD-DFT methods were utilized to study the solvatochromic shift of benzophenone when changing the environment from normal water to supercritical (P = 340.2 atm and T = 673 K) condition. Solute polarization increases the dipole moment of benzophenone, compared to gas phase, by 88 and 35% in normal and supercritical conditions, giving the in-solvent dipole value of 5.8 and 4.2 D, respectively. The average number of solute-solvent hydrogen bonds was analyzed, and a large decrease of 2.3 in normal water to only 0.8 in the supercritical environment was found. By using these polarized models of benzophenone in the two different conditions of water, we performed MC simulations to generate statistically uncorrelated configurations of the solute surrounded by the solvent molecules and subsequent quantum mechanics calculations on these configurations. When changing from normal to supercritical water environment, INDO/CIS calculations explicitly considering all valence electrons of the 235 solvent water molecules resulted in a solvatochromic shift of 1425 cm(-1) for the most intense pi-pi* transition of benzophenone, that is, slightly underestimated in comparison with the experimentally inferred result of 1700 cm(-1). TD-B3LYP/6-311+G(2d,p) calculations on the same configurations but with benzophenone electrostatically embedded in the 320 water molecules resulted in a solvatochromic shift of 1715 cm(-1) for this transition, in very good agreement with the experimental result. When using the unpolarized model of the benzophenone, this calculated solvatochromic shift was only 640 cm(-1). Additional calculations were also made by using BHandHLYP/6-311+G(2d,p) to analyze the effect of the asymptotic decay of the exchange functional. This study indicates that, contrary to the general expectation, there is a sizable solute polarization even in the low-density regime of supercritical condition and that the inclusion of this polarization is important for a reliable description of the spectral shifts considered here.