Abstract
The quantum chemistry of conformation equilibrium is a field where great accuracy (better than 100 cal mol−1) is needed because the energy difference between molecular conformers rarely exceeds 1000–3000 cal mol−1. The conformation equilibrium of straight-chain (normal) alkanes is of particular interest and importance for modern chemistry. In this paper, an extra error source for high-quality ab initio (first principles) and DFT calculations of the conformation equilibrium of normal alkanes, namely the intramolecular basis set superposition error (BSSE), is discussed. In contrast to out-of-plane vibrations in benzene molecules, diffuse functions on carbon and hydrogen atoms were found to greatly reduce the relative BSSE of n-alkanes. The corrections due to the intramolecular BSSE were found to be almost identical for the MP2, MP4, and CCSD(T) levels of theory. Their cancelation is expected when CCSD(T)/CBS (CBS, complete basis set) energies are evaluated by addition schemes. For larger normal alkanes (N > 12), the magnitude of the BSSE correction was found to be up to three times larger than the relative stability of the conformer; in this case, the basis set superposition error led to a two orders of magnitude difference in conformer abundance. No error cancelation due to the basis set superposition was found. A comparison with amino acid, peptide, and protein data was provided.
Acknowledgements
E. Lomakina is acknowledged for her help with manuscript preparation. I. Samoilenko is acknowledged for his computational assistance (software and hardware). This study was partly supported by a special grant from the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation.