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Title: A nine-dimensional ab initio global potential energy surface for the H{sub 2}O{sup +} + H{sub 2} → H{sub 3}O{sup +} + H reaction

Journal Article · · Journal of Chemical Physics
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1063/1.4881943· OSTI ID:22420101
;  [1]
  1. Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87131 (United States)

An accurate full-dimensional global potential energy surface (PES) is developed for the title reaction. While the long-range interactions in the reactant asymptote are represented by an analytical expression, the interaction region of the PES is fit to more than 81 000 of ab initio points at the UCCSD(T)-F12b/AVTZ level using the permutation invariant polynomial neural network approach. Fully symmetric with respect to permutation of all four hydrogen atoms, the PES provides a faithful representation of the ab initio points, with a root mean square error of 1.8 meV or 15 cm{sup −1}. The reaction path for this exoergic reaction features an attractive and barrierless entrance channel, a submerged saddle point, a shallow H{sub 4}O{sup +} well, and a barrierless exit channel. The rate coefficients for the title reaction and kinetic isotope effect have been determined on this PES using quasi-classical trajectories, and they are in good agreement with available experimental data. It is further shown that the H{sub 2}O{sup +} rotational enhancement of reactivity observed experimentally can be traced to the submerged saddle point. Using our recently proposed Sudden Vector Projection model, we demonstrate that a rotational degree of freedom of the H{sub 2}O{sup +} reactant is strongly coupled with the reaction coordinate at this saddle point, thus unraveling the origin of the pronounced mode specificity in this reaction.

OSTI ID:
22420101
Journal Information:
Journal of Chemical Physics, Vol. 140, Issue 22; Other Information: (c) 2014 AIP Publishing LLC; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0021-9606
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English